PUBS'J 


UNIFICATION  OF  RAILWAY  TERMINALS 


AND 


ELIMINATION  OF  GRADE  CROSSINGS 


IN    LOS  ANGELES 


REPORT 

TO  THE 

MAYOR  AND  CITY  COUNCIL  OF  LOS  ANGELES 

SEPTEMBER  6,  1920  % 

•  Synopsis  of  report  of  the  Advisory 

•  Ctte*  appointed  Dsrceiriber  8,  1919  on 
I  the  grade  crossing  and  terminal  pro- 
|  gress  reports  of  the  Engineers  of 

the  State  Railroad  Commission*  192CL 


By 

SPECIAL  COMMITTEE 


PHILO  J.  BEVERIDGE 
FRED  W.  BLANCHARD 
MARCO  H.  HELLMAN 
HARRY  HAWGOOD 
SAMUEL  STORROW 


LIBRARY 
PUBLIC  AFFAIRS  SERVICE 

APR  2  8  1971 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
LOS  ANGELES 


REPORT 


OF  THE 


ADVISORY   COMMITTEE 

APPOINTED  DECEMBER  8,  1919 


ON 


THE  GRADE  CROSSING 

AND 

TERMINAL  PROGRESS  REPORTS 

J 


OF  THE 


ENGINEERS  OF  THE  STATE 
RAILROAD  COMMISSION 


. 

u      . 


September  6,  1920 


Los  Angeles,  California, 
September  8th,  1920. 


The  Honorable  Mayor,  and 
The  Public  Utilities  Committee  of  the  Council, 
City  of  Los  Angeles,  Calif. 

Gentlemen: — 

Herewith  we  transmit  to  you  our  "Study  of  the  Eailroad  Commis- 
sioners '  Eeport ' ',  as  requested  by  you. 

Should  there  be  any  further  matters  in  which  we  can  assist  you 
we  are  glad  to  place  our  services  at  your  disposal  in  any  matters  per- 
taining to  The  Betterment  of  Los  Angeles. 

Sincerely  yours, 

H.  HAWGOOD,  Chairman 
SAMUEL  STOEEOW,  Secretary 


SYNOPSIS  OF  REPORT  OF  ADVISORY 
COMMITTEE 

Page 

Date  of  appointment  and  appointing  Resolution,  with  description  and 
purpose  of  Report 7 

Names  of  Committee.  The  engineers  also  served  as  members  of  ' '  The 
Engineering  Conference "  7 

The  problem  is  the  betterment  of  terminal  facilities  and  elimination  of 
grade  crossings,  with  rerouting  and  designs  of  viaducts  to  bring 
this  about 9 

Broad  point  of  view  necessary 10 

Official  description  of  Complaint  and  Proceedings < 11 

Early  studies  of  the  City  Council,  culminating  in  codified  report  of 
Hamlin-Howell-Storrow  adopted  by  the  Council  and  forwarded  to 
the  Railroad  Commission  as  the  policy  of  the  City  to  be  followed 
in  the  future  12 

Reconfirmed  by  the  Resolution  of  August  30,  1920. 12 

Railroad  Commission  orders  complete  engineering  investigation,  and 
issues  Sachse  Report,  which  is  furnished  to  all  parties  interested, 
and  orders  ' '  Engineering  Conference ' '  to  consider  alterations  of 
the  Sachse  Report 16 

Hawgood  and  Storrow,  one  or  another  or  both,  were  on  all  sub-com- 
mittees of  the  Engineering  Conference 16 

Conclusions  of  Mayor's  Committee;  that  the  plans  for  the  elimina- 
tion of  grade  crossings  and  the  building  of  the  Plaza  station, 
are  correct  14  and  32 

Recommendations  of  Mayor's  Committee;  that  immediate  construction 
be  undertaken  15  and  52 

Detailed  examination  and  discussion  of  Sachse  Report,  which  was  writ- 
ten as  a  treatment  from  engineering,  historical,  city  planning  and 
financial  aspects 16 

Grade  crossings  a  controlling  engineering  element  is  solved  by  the  gen- 
eral  scheme  of  depressed  river  bank  tracks  and  the  elimination  of 
Alameda  Street  tracks 17 

Santa  Fe  plan  for  elimination  of  grade  crossings  and  the  operation 
of  the  Pasadena  branch  of  the  Salt  Lake  over  Santa  Fe  tracks, 
and  all  this  necessitates  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal  to  carry 
out  the  elimination  of  grade  crossings 17 

Necessity  of  eliminating  grade  crossings IS- 

3 


Page 
Desirability  of  Union  Passenger  Terminal  from  various  angles: 

(a)  From  all  consideration;  and, 

(b)  From  the  individual  considerations 22 

(c)  The  need  of  rebuilding  present   stations,   with   extensive  re- 
adjustment of  trackage  at  all  existing  station? 24 

(d)  Need   of  getting  all  passenger   trains   and  attendant   engine 
movement  off  of  Alameda  St 25 

(e)  Demand  of  the  Southern  Pacific,  Salt  Lake  and  Pacific  Elec- 
tric for  a  Joint  Passenger  Station,  which  nullifies  their  stated 
objection   to   a  Union   Passenger   Terminal 22 

(f)  Acceptance   by   Messrs.    Kamp   and   Ripley   of   Atchison,   To- 
peka  &  Santa  Fe  of  Plaza  location 24 

(g)  Necessity  of  rebuilding  viaducts  across  the  river 21 

.(h)  Necessity  of  communication  with  East  Side  without  -crossing 
any  lines  of  heavy  steam  traffic  or  heavy  interurban  electric 
traffic,  which  also  means  elimination  of  Alameda  Street  and 
Fourth  Street  grade  crossings,  and  absence  of  heavy  grades 
and  sharp  curves  for  steam  or  electric  separating  Boyle 
Heights  from  the  main  city 30 

The  opportunity  presented  by  the  proximity  of  all  main  lines  at  north 
end  of  city,  and  the  concentration  of  all  suburban  highways  and 
main  city  streets  at  north  end  of  city  has  induced  the  reports  of 
all  engineers,  not  in  railroad  employ,  to  favor  the  north  end,  which 
includes  the  proposal  of  depressing  steam  tracks  along  the  river 
banks  and  a  Union  Station  necessarily  located  north  or  south  of 
the  center  of  the  city 25 

Eequirements  of  Union  Passenger  Terminal  as  to  location,  buildings, 
tracks,  yards  and  appurtenances  shown  in  Saehse  Report,  Engi- 
neers' Conference  and  general  knowledge.  (See  also  "City  Plan- 
ning", page  49).  (See  also,  "Point  of  View",  page  12) . .  .27 

Growth  of  Main  Line  traffic  and  its  connection  to  Interurban  Distri- 
bution brings  about  the  correction  of  Saehse  estimates  of  train 
traffic 27 

The  railroad  engineers  estimate  that  200  trains  or  sections  per  day 
fills  the  Arcade  Station  solid,  even  when  making  the  time  table 
themselves .28 

The  necessity  of  opportunity  for  the  several  railroads  to  occupy  segre- 
gated tracks  in  the  station 33 

The  only  basis  of  comparison  of  sites  and  plans  and  cost  requires  that 
all  proposals  shall  furnish  essentially  the  same  utilities  and  facil- 
ities and  betterments  of  existing  defects,  which  means  an  esti- 
mate of  estimate  of  costs  of  temporary  makeshift  arrangement  now 
asked  for  by  the  railroads,  adding  figures  for  Santa  Fe  System  for 


Page 

reconstruction  of  Main  and  Sixth,  for  enlargement  of  Arcade  to  17  or 
20  tracks,  for  extension  northward  to  relocation  of  Fourth  Street 
and  also  southward  across  Sixth  Street  to  provide  mail,  express, 
baggage,  and  other  extensions  and  facilities,  and  this  arrangement 
can  never  connect  with  the  subway  system 31 

The  ultimate  electric  operation  of  all  terminals  and  of  electric  inter- 
urbans  requires  an  Elongated  or  Circuit  Terminal  into  which  all  in- 
terurbans  will  feed,  and  this  Elongated  or  Circuit  Terminal  must 
not  admit  steam  trains 34 

These  obligatory  requirements  must  be  met  and  therefore  any  costs  re- 
quired to  get  them  must  be  met,  and  the  problem  is  not  to  avoid 
the  costs,  but  to  get  full  value  for  the  cost  and  to  spread  it  in^time 
and  over  as  many  shoulders  as  possible 22 

The  present  freight  system  is  a  series  of  L.C.L.  facilities,  including 
team  yards,  and  the  present  call  of  the  railroads  is  for  an  increase 
in  the  number  of  these  facilities.  This  was  worked  out  in  a  com- 
petitive way  as  an  adjustment  of  the  demands  of  the  shippers,  with 
a  reluc.tant  willingness  of  the  carriers  to  meet  these  demands,  and 
this  system  of  development  should  be  encouraged;  with  due  re- 
gard to  the  rights  not  only  of  these  parties,  but  of  the  other  users 
of  the  streets  and  the  City  as  a  whole,  who  have  been  rather 
neglected 26 

A  single  L.C.L.  freight  station  is  inconsistent  with  the  above  require- 
ment, because  the  growth  of  the  city,  of  the  harbor  district,  and 
of  the  connecting  district  means  a  distinct  increase  of  L.C.L. 
freight  facilities,  which,  however,  should  not  be  purely  competi- 
tive, but  should  be  open  to  all  steam  or  electric  lines,  now  here  or 
coming 45 

The  development  of  interurban  traffic  consists  of  delivering  passengers 
to  final  destination,  largely  west  of  Main  Street,  with  the  choice 
of  several  points  of  entrance  and  egress  from  trains,  and  this  can 
be  done  only  by  separating  interurban  cars  from  all  other  cars, 
and  this  necessarily  means  an  elevated  or  a  subway 35 

Los  Angeles  has  adopted  the  system  of  street  viaducts  and  therefore 
must  not  adopt  the  system  of  car  viaducts,  either  steam  or  elec- 
tric (and  all  steam  near  terminals  will  ultimately  be  electric),  be-  v 
cause  this  would  make  a  conflict  as  the  development  was  worked                       ^ 
out    30  and  40 

The  necessity  is  for  faster  interurban  ears,  obtainable  only  by  elimi- 
nation of  grade  crossings  ^and  the  routing  of  all  interurban  trains 
into  an  elongated  terminal,  preferably  free  of  stub  ends,  and  this 
must  be  of  gradual  growth  along  a  pre-conceived  design,  keeping 
pace  with  the  growth  of  the  city  and  therefore  self-evidently  north 
and  south  .  34 


Page 

City  Planning  requires  concentration  of  utilities  in  separate  centers  for 
each  system  of  utilities,  with  zones  or  districts  adapted  to  the  sev- 
eral kinds  of  business  involved,  and  that  these  several  zones  be  fit- 
ted with  the  facilities  pertaining  to  each 42 

Hysteric  sentiment  about  non-historic  Plaza 43 

City  Planning  in  Los  Angeles  is  non-existent,  but  the  growth  has  been 
accidental  and  later  growth  particularly  deficient  in  through  streets 
:nul  open  spaces,  and  Los  Angeles  now  requires  new  City  Hall, 
Jail,  Library,  Auditorium,  Hospital,  etc.,  with  provision  for  Mu- 
seum or  Memorial  buildings 44 

City  Planning  therefore  requires  an  Elongated  or  Circuit  Terminal, 
with  the  various  districts  around  this  circuit 34 

The  Subway  requires  further  study 46 

Costs 22  and  32  and  47 

Jurisdiction  of  the  Railroad  Commission  in  association  with  the  City 
Council  has  been  sustained 51 

Final  recommendations: — That  the  City  of  Los  Angeles  approve  the 
Sachse  Plans  (as  modified  herein  and  by  the  Engineering  Confer- 
ence) for  the  Elimination  of  Grade  Crossings  by  the: — 

(a)  Building  of  depressed  tracks  on  the  river  banks; 

(b)  Building  of  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal  on  or  adjacent  to  the 
Plaza; 

(c)  Eliminating  through  tracks  on  Alameda  Street. 

(d)  Encourage  more  and  union  freight  terminals. 14  and  52 


Los  Angeles,  California, 
September  6th,  1920. 


Public  Utilities  Committee  of  the  Council, 

City  of  Los  Angeles, 
Los  Angeles,  California. 

Gentlemen: — 

Your  Committee,  appointed  by  your  Eesolution  of  December  8,  1919, 
having  fully  considered  the  matters  submitted  to  them,  now  renders  to 
you  this,  their  formal  report. 

ORGANIZATION. 

Your  appointing  Resolution  reads  as  follows: 

"That  the  Mayor  be,  and  he  is  hereby,  requested  to  appoint 
a  Committee  of  five  persons,  two  of  whom  shall  be  compe- 
tent engineers,  to  make  a  study  of  said  Eailroad  Commis- 
sion's Eeport  and  furnish  to  the  Public  Utilities  Committee 
of  the  Council,  in  writing,  the  result  of  said  study." 

The  report  above  described  as  the  Eailroad  Commission's  report  is 
the  report  to  the  Eailroad  Commission  of  the  State  of  California  made 
to  them  by  their  Chief  Engineer,  Eiehard  Sachse,  dated  by  letter  of 
transmittal  to  the  Eailroad  Commission  July  31,  1919,  printed  in  Los 
Angeles,  and  issued  to  the  parties  interested  on  January  23rd,  1920. 

The  Saschse  Report  contains  the  following  statement  of  the  further 
action  proposed  by  the  Commission,  and  this  was  confirmed  by  the  oral 
statement  of  Mr.  Edgerton: — 

"It  is  the  Commission's  intention  that  *  *  *  the  rec- 
ommendations contained  in  the  Eeport  shall  be  revised  and 
that  finally  the  Commission  shall  make  its  decision  and  or- 
der." (Sachse— 20.) 

The  Committee  appointed  by  the  Mayor  in  accordance  with  your 
Besolution  above  set  out  was: — 

Mr.  Philo  J.  Beveridge, 
Mr.  F.  W.  Blanchard, 
Mr.  Marco  Hellman, 
Mr.  H.  Hawgood, 
Mr.  Samuel  Storrow. 

Messrs.  Hawgood  and  Storrow  are  the  engineer  members  and  have 
been  identified  with  engineering  development  of  California  and  the 
southwest  for  more  than  thirty  years.  The  other  three  members  of  the 


Committee  are  men  of  wide  and  broad  business  training  involving  prop- 
erties closely  allied  with  the  problems  in  the  present  instance. 

This  Committee  organized  by  election  of  Mr.  Hawgood  as  chairman 
and  Mir.  Storrow  as  secretary  and  got  promptly  to  work  studying  the 
"Sachse  Report"  and  the  many  allied  comments  thereon  which  came 
from  all  parties  who  felt  that  they  were  in  some  way  or  another  con- 
cerned in  the  possible  findings  or  recommendations  which  might  grow 
out  of  the  Sachse  Report  and  the  investigation  of  the  problem  by  the 
Railroad  Commission. 


THE  PROBLEM. 

The  problem  in  hand  is  the  betterment  in  a  permanent  way  of  the  "\ 

terminal  facilities  in  Los  Angeles,  including  elimination  of  grade  cross- 
ings between  streets  and  steam  railroads  and  electric  railroads  or  any 
of  them,  with  such  rerouting  of  steam  lines  and  electric  lines  and  the 
reconstruction  of  streets  and  viaducts  and  any  other  allied  matters  as 
ndght  be  connected  with  the  solution  of  this  problem.  (Sachse,  11,  19, 
20,  21.) 


POINTS  OF  VIEW. 

Your  Committee  have  intended  to  make  their  study  of  the  Sachse 
Report  fit  in  with  a  thorough  study  of  all  the  conditions  of  the  problem 
and  have  tried  to  examine  the  entire  situation  in  a  broad  and  unbiased 
way,  with  full  consideration  of  the  likes  and  points  of  view  of  the  many 
interests  concerned,  which  may  be  considered  as  the  view  points  of  the 
following  several  different  parties: — 

1st.  The  Railroad  Corporation,  reflecting  the  attitude  of  non-resident 
directors  of  a  corporation  not  personally  interested  in  the  up- 
building of  the  city; 

2nd.  The  Local  or  State  Management  of  the  railroad  corporation, 
jealous  of  any  outside  suggestion  of  how  the  property  shall  be 
developed  or  managed,  and  under  continual  pressure  to  maintain 
earnings  and  keep  down  expenses;  and  desirous  always  of  bene- 
fitting  each  his  own  road,  even  at  the  expense  of  a  competitor, 
and  always  at  the  expense  of  the  shipper  or  passenger. 

3rd.  The  City,  interested  in  the  long  continued  and  long  term  develop- 
ment of  the  terminals  and  industrial  properties  and  the  con- 
venience and  benefits  of  its  citizens,  including  corporate  inter- 
ests operating  within  its  boundaries. 

4th.  The  Local  Tax  Payer,  who  instinctively  feels  that  the  enormous 
railroad  and  terminal  holdings  are  liable  to  be  assessed  at  less 
than  his  own  rate  of  assessment,  and  who  resents  being  called 
upon  to  pay  taxes  for  betterments  in  which  he  sometimes  feels 
he  is  not  vitally  interested. 

5th.  The  Eeal  Estate  Owner,  who  favors  the  plan  that  expends  money 
for  his  benefit  and  opposes  a  plan  which  he  does  not  feel  will 
benefit  his  own  property. 

6th.  The  Stockholder,  generally  interested  only  in  maximum  return  on 
his  investment,  with  little  regard  to  operation  or  welfare  of  the 
community. 

7th.  The  Bondholder,  frequently  acting  as  a  dog  in  the  manger,  tying 
up  the  uses  and  controls  of  the  present  properties  in  a  way  that 
often  makes  readjustments  and  reconstructions  most  difficult. 

8th.  The  Main  Line  Passenger,  favoring  the  road  with  the  shortest 
running  time,  best  equipment  and  best  advertising,  without  much 
knowledge  or  regard  to  the  location  of  the  facilities. 

9th.  The  Interurban  Passenger,  whose  sole  interest  is  usually  low 
fares  and  quick  access  to  the  street  location  where  he  proposes 
to  do  business. 

10 


10th.  The  Freight  Shipper,  who  in  Los  Angeles  is  generally  interested 
mostly  in  fast  truck  delivery  to  convenient  terminals  and  fast 
rail  delivery;  in  direct  competition  with  the  handling  of  inter- 
urban  freight  by  motor  truck. 

llth.  The  Broad-minded  Citizen,  who  is  interested  primarily  in  the  up- 
building of  his  city,  with  an  eye  to  its  beauty,  effectiveness,  con- 
venience and  ultimate  growth. 

It  is  clear  that  in  this  instance  these  eleven  conflicting  points  of 
view  require  a  very  broad  and  honest  and  disinterested  study  of  the 
problem  to  determine: — 

1st.     What  are  the  defects  of  the  present  situation;  (Pages  14,  18,  et  seq.) 

2nd.  What  are  the  requirements  of  the  correct  solution;  (Pages  21,  29 
et  seq.) 

3rd.  The  choice  between  the  several  possibilities  which  fulfill  the  re- 
quirements and  which  add  the  greatest  number  of  desirable  fea- 
tures. (Page  14.) 

It  is  clear  that  the  requirements  of  the  situation  must  be  met.   After  j 

the  requirements  are  fulfilled  the  project  which   furnishes  the  greatest 
number  of  additional  desirable  features  is  the  most  meritorious. 

Hitherto  we  have  been  required  to  consider  all  schemes  from  the 
point  of  view  of  voluntary  cooperation  of  all  the  interested  parties, 
particularly  the  extremely  competitive  railroads  and  sometimes  com- 
placent city.  At  the  present  time  in  the  present  problem  we  have  a 
City  Council  strongly  on  record  as  desirous  to  bring  about  thorough 
treatment  of  the  problem,  (page  12),  and  the  necessity  for  the  full 
hearted  cooperation  of  the  competitive  carriers  is  tempered  by  the  fact 
that  the  Railroad  Commission  have  full  jurisdiction  to  make  and  enforce 
their  order,  (with  the  assistance  of  the  City,  page  51),  and  three  of 
the  four  carriers  have  already  asked  for  the  privilege  of  building  a 
joint  union  station  (page  29,  et  seq),  and  the  fourth  carrier  has  stated 
a  willingness  to  go  into  a  union  station,  but  objects  to  the  location  pro- 
posed by  the  other  three.  (Page  24.) 

This  whole  terminal  matter  was  brought  to  an  active  head  by 
the  bringing  of  several  complaints  before  the  Eailroad  Commission  of 
the  State  of  California  known  as  "Los  Angeles  Railroad  Grade  Cross-  \ 

ing  and  Terminal   Investigation.     Cases   970   et   seq."    (Se    "Jurisdic- 
tion" p.  51). 

The  City  Council  and  the  governing  bodies  of  Los  Angeles  had  for 
a  long  time  been  studying  and  working .  on  the  elimination  of  grade 
crossings  in  Los  Angeles,  and  brought  the  matter  to  a  definite  position 
by  a  formal  report  which  in  due  time  became  "Exhibit  A"  to  the  Com-  . 
plaint  in  Case  970  above  quoted.  This  report  was  the  first  definite  plan 
presented  for  the  elimination  of  grade  crossings  and  was  made  May  13, 

11 


1916,  by  Homer  Hamlin,  City  Ki;gim>er,  F.  D.  Howell,  Chief  Engineer 
of  the  Board  of  Public  I'tiliiics,  and  Samuel  Storrow,  Consulting  Engi- 
neer. It  was  addressed  to  the  Viaduct  Committee  of  the  City  Council, 
who  had  appointed  the  above  named  engineers  for  the  purpose  of  pre- 
paring a  report.  This  report  was  adopted  by  the  Viaduct  Committee, 
who  transmitted  the  same  to  the  Council  of  the  City  of  Los  Angeles, 
with  the  following  recommendations: — 

"That  the  report  be  adopted  as  a  policy  to  be  followed  in 
the  future  and  that  the  Council  request  the  State  Railroad 
Commission  *  *  *  *  to  carry  out  the  plans  submitted. ' ' 

This  letter  of  transmittal  was  signed  by  all  the  members  of  the 
Committee  and  on  May  16,  1916,  the  report  of  the  Viaduct  Committee, 
with  the  Hamlin-Howell-Storrow  report  attached,  was  unanimously 
adopted  by  the  Council  and  transmitted  to  the  State  Railroad  Commis- 
sion. 

This  position  of  the  City  has  been  most  ably  restated  and  recon- 
firmed along  these  same  lines  by  the  Resolution  passed  by  the  Council 
on  August  30,  1920,  with  the  order  that  this  Resolution  be  transmitted 
to  the  Railroad  Commission,  wherein  it  is  set  out  that  the  reports  of 
Bion  J.  Arnold  and  other  impartial  engineers  and  experts  who  have 
examined  the  subject  have  advised  in  favor  of  a  Union  Passenger  Ter- 
minal and  the  creation  of  joint  freight  terminals,  and  that  the  city 
planning  is  embarrassed,  if  not  held  up,  until  complete  designs  for  this 
work  have  been  decided  upon: — 

"Therefore,  Be  It  Resolved,  That  the  State  Railroad  Com- 
mission be  informed  that  it  is  the  judgment  of  this  Body 
that  these  matters  should  be  decided  upon  as  soon  as  pos- 
sible, and  that  their  decision,  in  accordance  with  the  uni- 
versal findings  of  the  aforementioned  engineering  experts, 
should  provide  for  the  establishment  of  both  Union  Pas- 
senger and  Freight  Stations  in  the  City  of  Los  Angeles,  and 
no  other  solution  will  satisfy  this  Council." 

"In  the  present  situation  the  property  values  and  equity  involved 
are  so  large  and  the  interests  so  complicated  as  a  result  of  long  years 
of  development,  rearrangement,  reconstruction,  acute  competition  and 
lack  of  adequate  municipal  supervision,  that  the  question  immediately 
arises: 

"Shall  expediency  and  minimum  cost  govern  or  shall  permanent 
development,  based  upon  the  lessons  of  the  past  and  the  unquestioned 
needs  of  the  future,  prevail."  (Sachse,  60;  quotation  from  the  Arnold 
Report  on  the  rearrangement  in  Chicago.) 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  it  is  the  intent  of  appointing  this  Ad-, 
visory  Committee  that  this  problem  should  be  looked  at  from  the  broad- 

12 


est,  fairest  possible  point  of  view,  and  that  this  Committee  feels  that 
the  requirements  of  a  Union  Station,  from  an  engineering  standpoint, 
and  from  certain  of  the  other  standpoints,  have  been  well  set  out  in 
the  Sachse  Eeport. 


18 


CONCLUSIONS. 

The  Advisory  Committee,  having  given  much  study  to  all  the  con- 
ditions and  points  of  view  of  the  problem,  and  to  the  extremely  definite 
and  lucid  studies  in  the  Sachse  Report,  and  being  familiar  with  the 
instructions  and  investigations  of  the  Engineering  Conference,  and  hav- 
ing been  very  fully  ;ul\is(><l  by  many  people  and  by  its  own  knowledge 
of  the  points  of  view  heretofore  set  out,  and  being  frequently  in  receipt , 
of  verbal  and  written  communications  from  many  public  and  semi- 
public  organizations,  has  unanimously  reached  the  following  list  of  con- 
clusions and  recommendations: — 

CONCLUSIONS  OF  FACT. 

1.  Grade  crossings  in  Los  Angeles  must  be  abolished  in  the  center  of 
the  City  at  once,  and  ultimately  throughout  the  city  limits.  This 
applies  to  both  steam  and  interurban  lines. 

'2.  Ultimately  all  steam  lines  or  interurban  lines  longitudinal  in  the 
streets  must  be  eliminated, 

3.  The  viaducts  across  the  river  must  be  rebuilt  at  approximately 
half  their  present  grades,  but  without  material,  if  any,  increase 
of  length  end  to  end  of  approaches. 

V^jtT}  Electric    interurban    cars   must    continuel  in    some    way  jto    operate 
longitudinally  through  the  city. 

o.  Transfer  shall  be  made,  by  which  all  interurban  cars  operate  over 
an  elongated  terminal  or  circuit. 

6.  Interurban  passengers  must  not  be  obliged  to  enter  and  leave  cars 
at  a  single  station,  but  rather  at  a  series  of  stations,  preferably 
no  station  being  a  stub  station.  • 

7.  Convenience  of  the  city,  public  and  the  railroads,  requires  a  Union 
Passenger  Station  for  all  main  line  carriers,  and  that  station  should 
be  entered  by  regular  trains  of  all  divisions  of  the  interurban  lines. 

Hy  The  physical  requirements  of  area,  accessibilities,  city  planning, 
and  convenience  of  all  parties,  require  that  the  Union  Passenger 
Station  shall  be  located  at  the  north  end  of  the  city  on  or  adjacent 
to  the  Plaza. 

9.  The  plans  outlined  in  the  Sachse  Eeport  for  a  Union  Station  adja- 
cent to  the  Plaza  are  approved  and  satisfactory;  minor  relocations, 
adjustments  and  redesignments  may  be  studied  to  the  end  of  less 
cost,  if  desired. 

10.  We  are  unanimously  of  the  opinion  that  the  Union  Passenger  Ter- 
minal should  be  located  in  the  vicinity  of  the  old  Plaza,  but  we 
think  that  further  study  by  the  engineers  and  various  interests 
concerned  will  develop  a  plan  better  harmonizing  the  many  con- 
flicts of  opinion  than  the  location  set  out  on  Page  363  of  the  Sachse 
Eeport. 

(See  also  pages  15  and  52.) 

14 


RECOMMENDATIONS  FOR  ACTION. 
We  recommend, — 

1st.      That  the  City  Council  reaffirm  that  the  position  taken  by  the  City 
in  this  whole  controversy  is: — 

(a)  All  grade  crossings  of  steam  or  interurban  cars  over  which  such 
cars  can  operate  must  be  eliminated  by  a  design  to  be  undertaken 
at  once; 

(b)  That  a  Union  Passenger  Station,  to  be  entered  by  all  steam  and 
interurban  lines,  shall  be  designed  to  be  located  in  the  north  end 
of  the  City  on  or  adjacent  to  the  Plaza,  in  connection  with  the 
locating  of  all  main  line  tracks  for  the  steam  lines  depressed  on 
both  banks  of  the  river,  in  general  accord  with  the  designs  set 
out  in  the  Saehse  Report; 

(c)  That  the  interurban  system  be  readjusted  looking  to  the  ultimate 

building  of  a  circuit  or  elongated  Terminal  north  and  south 
through  the  City;  and  that  in  no  event  shall  the  interurban  sys- 
tem lead  into  a  single  stub  end  station; 

(d)  That  the  railroads  be  encouraged  to  develop  a  series  of  L.  C.  L. 
freight  stations,  to  which  all  roads  shall  have  equal  access; 

(e)  That  the   delivery  of  cars   to   industries  properly   located   in   the 
industrial  district  shall  be  encouraged  in  every  way  possible; 

(f)  That  the  system  of  viaducts  across  the  river  shall  be  redesigned 
according  to  the  recommendations  of  the  Saehse  Report,  as  modi- 
fied by  the  Engineering  Conference. 

2nd.  That  the  City  join  with  the  State  Railroad  Commission  in  car- 
rying out  these  plans  at  the  earliest  possible  moment,  with 
the  suggestion  to  the  State  Railroad  Commission  that  the 
continued  study  of  problems  necessary  to  prepare  the  de- 
signs for  actual  beginning  of  operations,  will  admit  of  minor 
modifications  of  the  serial  development  and  the  installation 
of  the  several  utilities  in  such  way  that  the  total  cost  can  be 
reduced  from  the  cost  of  the  Plaza  design  of  the  Saehse  Re- 
port; and  to  this  end  advise  the  study  of  minor  modifica- 
tions of  the  exact  site  to  be  occupied  in  the  vicinity  of  the  "\ 
Plaza.  J 


15 


THE    SACHSE    REPORT,    ITS   FINDINGS    &    RECOMMENDATIONS. 

The  State  Railroad  Commission  instructed  its  engineers:   - 
"to  make  a  complete  engineering  invest  \^-.i\  ion  into  the  Los 
Angeles  railroad  grade  crossings  and  freight  and  passenger 
terminal  situation  and  report  to  the  Commission  on  all  the 
matters  above   referred  to."      (Sachse,   11.) 

This  investigation  by  the  engineers  of  the  Railroad  Commission 
sustained  all  the  essential  points  of  the  Hamlin-Howell-Storrow  Report, 
and  was  transmitted  to  the  Railroad  Commission  in  the  so-called  "Sachse 
Report ' '  above  referred  to,  and  by  you  now  referred  to  us,  your  Ad- 
visory Committee,  for  study  and  explanation;  which  is  rendered  neces- 
sary by  the  fact  that  the  report  is  extremely  technical  in  character 
and  includes  587  finely-printed  quarto  pages,  with  many  maps  and  draw- 
ings. After  the  Sachse  Report  had  been  rendered  to  the  Commission 
and  copies  furnished  to  all  the  parties  interested,  (January  23,  1920). 
the  Railroad  Commission  directed  its  engineers  to  call  a  conference 
of  such  engineers  as  might  be  appointed  by  the  interested  parties,  for 
complete  discussion  of  all  the  engineering  problems,  and  after  a  series 
of  meetings  and  discussions  formulated  a  set  of  rules  to  govern  the 
studies  of  this  Engineering  Conference,  which  by  that  time  had  been 
subdivided  into  a  series  of  sub-committees  for  the  purpose  of  individ- 
ually studying  the  several  parts  of  the  Report.  This  Engineering  Con- 
ference was  instructed  that  it  was  not  to  report  in  favor  of  or  against: — 

(a)  The  location  of  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal; 

(b)  The  policy  of  establishing  such  a  Terminal; 

(c)  The  apportionment  of  costs  between  the  parties  interested; 

(d)  Traffic  arrangements  between  the   parties   interested; 

(e)  Methods  of  financing; 

but  that  in  all  other  matters  the  Engineering  Conference  was  to  con- 
sider all  matters  submitted  in  the  Sachse  Report  and  was  given  a  free 
hand  to  advise  thereon;  to  the  end  that  the  recommendations  contained 
in  the  report  shall  be  revised  and  that  finally  the  Commission  shall 
make  its  decision  and  order.  (Sachse,  20.)  The  engineering  members 
of  this,  your  Advisory  Committee,  Messrs.  Hawgood  and  Storrow,  had 
the  great  advantage  of  being,  one  or  another  or  both  of  them,  on  all 
the  sub-committees,  and  therefore  were  able  to  keep  well  in  touch  with 
the  situation  as  it  developed  under  the  discussions,  or  absence  of  dis- 
cussions, of  the  various  details  of  the  Sachse  Report. 

The  report  of  the  Chief  Engineer  of  the  Railroad  Commission  was 
in  accordance  with  the  order  of  the  Commission  instructing  him  to 
make  a  complete  engineering  investigation  into  the  Los  Angeles  rail- 
road grade  crossing  and  freight  and  passenger  terminal  situation. 
(Sachse  11.) 

16 


The  report  treats  the  problem  from  an  engineering  point  of  view, 
with  frequent  reference  to  historical,  to  city  planning,  and  to  financial 
aspects  of  the  case. 

The   four  subjects   considered  are:> — (Sachse   12.) 
1st.      The  possibility  and  design  of  grade  crossing  elimination; 

2nd.     The  desirability,  location  and  design  for  a  Union  Passenger  Sta- 
tion; 

N 

3rd.     The  possibility  for  improvement  in  the  freight  situation; 
4th.    Interurban  and  city  traffic. 

The  grade  crossing  elimination  is  the  controlling  engineering  element 
in  the  entire  report,  and  to  a  large  extent  governs  the  solution  of  the 
union  terminal  and  freight  problems.  (Sachse  12.)  The  principles  of 
grade  crossing  elimination  adopted  are  to: — (Sachse  12.) 


lst.\     Eliminate    all    important   grade    crossings    on    both    banks    of   the 
v          Los  Angeles  River  by  depiessing  the  railroad  tracks  along  the 
river  banks.     Elevate  the  streets  over  and  across  both  the  rail- 
roads and  the   river  by  viaducts,  which   will  thus  be   lower   and 
on  easier  grades  than  those  now  existing;  ^) 

2nd.  Eliminate  all  through  traffic  from  the  tracks  on  Alameda  Street, 
excepting  only  industrial  switching  to  such  of  the  industries  sit- 
uated along  Alameda  Street  as  cannot  be  served  in  any  other 
way; 

3rd.  Accept  the  method  proposed  by  the  Santa  Fe  Railroad  for  the 
elimination  of  the  grade  crossings  of  61  street,  eight  electric 
railway,  and  two  steam  railroad  crossings;  between  Los  Angeles 
and  Pasadena; 

4th.  Eliminate  the  28  grade  crossings  of  the  Salt  Lake  Railroad  by 
requiring  that  road  to  operate  over  the  proposed  new  arrange- 
ment of  the  Santa  Fe. 

.1th.  Eliminate  certain  other  specified  crossings,  such  as  the  Butte 
Street  and  others,  by  methods  specified  in  each  instance. 

Mr.    Sachse,    in    common    with    all    the    other    engineers    who    have 
studied  this  matter,  makes  it  clear  that  from  the  point  of  view  of  all 

{the  considerations  governing  the  problem  that  there  can  be  no  solution  j 

along  the  five  elements  above  stated  excepting  by  the  building  of  a 
Union  Passenger  Terminal  and  strongly  hints  that  the  solution  will 
also  require  joint  operation  of  whatever  freight  terminal  facilities  are 
constructed. 


17 


THE  ELIMINATION  OF  GRADE  CROSSINGS. 

The  necessity  for  abolishing  the  grade  crossings  is  so  well  known 
to  all  those  in  Los  Angeles  who  have  given  thought  to  the  matter  that 
it  is  unnecessary  to  enlarge  upon  this  crying  need  except  to  give  a  few 
significant  figures  in  order  that  those  who  have  no  conception  of  the 
problem  may  realize  the  magnitude  of  the  figures  involved. 

Traffic  studies  indicate  that  in  1918  about  65,000,000  people  crossed 
the  Los  Angeles  River  and  the  tracks  of  the  Santa  Fe  and  Salt  Lake 
adjacent  to  the  river,  and  that  the  traffic  crossing  Alameda  Street  is 
about  20  per  cent  greater;  or  approximately  78,000,000  people  per  year 
crossing  the  tracks  of  the  Southern  I'acific  on  Alameda  Street.  These 
people  are  inconvenienced  in  two  ways, — by  the  time  loss  and  danger 
risk;  it  being  estimated  that  on  Seventh  Street  crossing  gates  have  been 
found  to  be  down  as  much  as  19  per  cent  of  the  daylight  hours;  (this 
is  in  1918,  and  the  business  is  increasing.)  (Sachse,  21.)  The  present 
railroad  traffic  over  the  grade  crossings  along  the  river  bank  amounts 
to  at  least  600  movements  per  24  hours  for  the  five  existing  grade  cross- 
ings adjacent  to  the  river  bank;  and  on  Alameda  Street  the  count  is 
shown  (on  page  200  of  the  Sachse  Keport)  to  be  over  1800  engine  move- 
ments over  the  19  crossings  counted;  Mr.  Sachse  says  (Sachse  23): — 

"The  average  street  north  of  the  Arcade  Station  is  crossed 
by  157  train  movements  each  day,  and  the  average  street 
south  of  the  station  is  crossed  by  98  train  movements.  This 
means  that  13  principal  streets  have  an  average  of  3315 
train  movements  daily." 

The  crossing  gates  at  Sixth  and  Seventh  Streets,  where  the  trains 
are  about  60  per  cent  of  the  trains  north  of  the  Arcade  Station,  are 
down  "over  15  per  cent  of  the  daylight  hours."  (Sachse  23.) 


18 


Tables  of  the  Actual  Count  of  Traffic  Crossing  the  Steam  Tracks 
on  Alameda  Street  and  of  Actual  Count  of  Engine  Movements  are 
given,  Two  of  Which  Are  Here  Eearranged.  (Saehse  197-200.) 

ALAMEDA  STREET  GRADE  CROSSING  TRAFFIC.   (Annual  Traffic) 


Traffic 
Crossing  the  Tracks 

North  of 
Arcade  Sta. 

South  of 
Arcade  Sta. 

Totals 

People  in  Vehicles  '.    . 

20,465,000 

9,214,000 

29,679,000 

Pedestrians  and  Bicycles  ....... 

8,453,000 

1,815,000 

10,268,000 

People  on  Cars  

30,263,000 

7,841,000 

38,104,000 

Totals  per  year  

59,181,000 

18,870,000 

78,051,000 

Average  per  Day  

162,000 

52,000 

214,000 

^Average  per  14-hour  day,  actual  count,  6  a.  m.  to  8  p.  m. 


Engines  Using  Tracks 


19  Crossings  from  Spring  to  Ninth  Sts. 


Hauling  Coaches,  etc  

347 

155 

502 

Hauling  Freight  Cars  

388 

115 

503 

Light  Engines  

302 

39 

341 

Total  Engine  Movements  .... 
Average  Minutes  Apart  

1037 
8/10  min. 

309 
2  7/10  min. 

1346 
0.62 

(37  K  sec.) 

The  Engine  Movement  8  p.  m.  to  6  a.  m.  is  more. 

*From  count  of  eleven  days  prior  to  U.  S.  Eailroad  Administration. 


VEHICLES    CROSSING   ALAMEDA    STREET    STEAM    TRACKS. 

Counted  at  Nine  Crossings.     (Sachse  198.) 
Per  Average  Day. 


North  of 
Arcade  Sta. 

South  of 
Arcade  Sta. 

Totals 

Automobiles     

16,514 

7,708 

24,222 

Trucks          '.  

9,589 

4,238 

13,827 

Wagons       

3,407 

1,121 

4,528 

Motorcycles  

755 

302 

1,057 

Electric  Cars  or  Trains  

3,458 

949 

4,407 

Totals  

33,723 

14,318 

48,041 

The  greater  part  of  these  cross  during  12  hours. 


20 


In  order  to   eliminate  these    grade   crossings    two   proposals   were 

made: — 

1st.  That  long,  high  viaducts  be  constructed  from  the  west  side  of 
Alameda  Street  to  the  east  side  of  the  Salt  Lake  tracks  east  of 
the  river;  and  it  was  the  storm  raised  by  this  proposal  that  had 
much  to  do  with  the  appointing  of  the  Commission  of  engineers 
to  assist  the  Viaduct  Committee  in  May,  1916,  resulting  in  the 
Hamlin-Howell-Storrow  Eeport  which  brought  back  a  proposal: — 

2nd.  That  the  viaduct  across  the  tracks  and  river  should  be  no  longer 
than  at  present,  and  should  be  lowered  to  a  grade  that  permitted 
about  twice  the  present  loads  to  be  hauled  over  them,  all  to  be 
accomplished  by  the  device  of  concentrating  and  depressing  all 
main  steam  tracks  on  the  east  and  west  banks  of  the  river;  which 
design  has  been  modified  and  improved  by  Mr.  Sachse.  (See  page 
17,  and  Sachse  125.,  137,  202,  et  al.) 

Mr.  Sachse  recommends  that  for  the  time  at  least  steam  tracks  be 
allowed  to  remain  on  Alameda  Street,  and  that  these  tracks  be  used 
only  for  switching  service  to  the  industries  which  cannot  be  otherwise 
reached;  but  we  add  to  this  recommendation  that  this  design  should 
carry  with  it  as  an  essential  that  the  tracks  on  Alameda  Street  shall 
not  connect  with  any  station  yards  nor  express  yards  nor  switching 
yards  nor  team  yards,  but  that  all  such  facilities  shall  be  reached  by 
tracks  going  directly  therefrom  to  the  main  lines  on  the  river  bank. 

The  construction  of  the  proposed  main  line  tracks  on  both  banks 
of  the  river,  and  the  construction  of  viaducts  across  the  railroads  and 
the  river,  includes  the  reconstruction  of  these  viaducts  at  lower  eleva- 
tions, with  lessened  grades  of  approach.-  These  designs  were  studied 
and  worked  up  and  are  set  out  in  the  Sachse  Eeport,  pages  157  to  191. 
The  Engineering  Conference  approved  of  all  these  designs,  excepting 
that  at  Aliso  Street  it  is  advised  that  the  bridge  shall  provide  for  the 
future  carrying  of  vehicles  and  local  street  car  traffic  separated  in  grade 
from  the  Pacific  Electric  tracks.  The  Conference  discussed  the  read- 
justment .of  the  Alhambra  Avenue  crossing  at  the  river,  with  the  idea 
that  at  some  future  time  a  grade  crossing  viaduct  should  connect  East 
Alhambra  Avenue  with  North  Broadway,  and  with  the  possible  future 
connection  through  to  Figueroa  Street.  The  Committee  also  advised 
that  in  the  design  for  the  Plaza  Station  arrangement  shall  be  made  for 
the  future  building  of  a  viaduct  to  carry  North  Spring  Street  over  the 
tracks  at  Eedondo  Street  when  necessity  requires.  A 

Your  Advisory  Committee  concurs  with  these  findings  of  the  Engi-  • 
neering  Conference,  and  excepting  as  these  recommendations  and  other 
recommendations  of  the  Committee  on  Grade  Crossing  Elimination  and 
on  Passenger  Terminals  modifies  the  Sachse  Report,  recommends  each 
and  severally  the  designs  of  the  Sachse  Report  for  the  reconstruction 
of  the  viaducts  over  the  river  and  the  building  of  depressed  tracks  on 
the  banks  thereon,  as  set  out  on  pages  157  to  191. 

(See  pages  14,  15  and  52.) 

21 


THE    PASSENGEE   TERMINAL. 

The  Sachse  Report  makes  a  very  exhaustive  study  of  the  desirability 
and  the  proposed  locations  of  the  Union  Passenger  Station,  going  into 
the  question  from  every  point  of  view,  and  arrives  at  the  final  con- 
clusion with  which  we  agree: — 

4 '  Taking  all  arguments  into  consideration,  we  feel  convinced 
that  a  union  station  is  desirable,  provided  it  may  be  suit- 
ably located."  (Sachse  13  &  27.) 

Your  Committee  in  studying  this  subject  have  before  it  most  vividly 
that  the  terminal  situation  and  grade  crossing  dangers  in  Los  Angeles 
have  become  intolerable  and  call  for  the  expenditure  of  vast  sums  of 
t money  within  the  next  few  years.  Tfce  choice  is  not  between  a  small 
or  no  expenditure  if  the  designs  are  not  carried  out,  and  a  large  expen- 
diture if  the  designs  are* carried  ou^,  but,  rather,  between  a  carefully 
planned  and  adequate}  design  ^capable  of  serial  and  continuous  develop- 
ment and  adapted  to  our  needs  for  many  years  to  come,  rather  than  a 
wasteful  expenditure  of  nearly  the  same  amount  in  a  series  of  indi- 
vidual and  competitive  designs  causing  wasteful  duplication  and  no  log- 
ical development  of  plans. 

The  Southern  Pacific  and  Salt  Lake  railroads  made  Application 
3346  for  the  approval  of  an  agreement  covering  joint  passenger  terminal 
facilities.  This  application,  in  a  slightly  modified  form,  was  before 
the  City  Council,  to  whom  designs  had  been  submitted  by  the  railroads, 
at  the  time  when  the  Railroad  Commission  took  hold  of  the  investiga- 
tion. Application  2962  was  for  the  Industrial  Terminal  Railway  to  de- 
velop a  Joint  Industrial  Switching  Terminal.  Application  3037  was  for 
the  Salt  Lake  Railroad,  who  desired  to  establish  fourteen  additional 
grade  crossings  in  order  that  they  might  reach  into  a  proposed  addi- 
tional freight  terminal  on  Alameda  Street.  There  were  also  sundry 
other  applications  and  requests  from  the  railroads  which  had  to  do  with 
changing  the  designs  of  the  terminal  situation  in  Los  Angeles,  and  we 
must  therefore  fully  face  the  fact  that  the  railroads  themselves  pro- 
pose to  expend  in  competitive  development  an  amount  which  would  ag 
gregate  not  far  from  the  figures  just  quoted  from  the  Sachse  Report 
Mr.  Sachse  says  on  page  15: — 

"While  a  capital  expenditure  of  over  $32,000,000  seems 
large,  it  should  be  remembered  that  this  money  is  to  be  ex- 
pended over  a  term  of  years.  In  any  event,  whether  the 
foregoing  recommendations  are  adopted  or  not,  very  large 
capital  expenditures  aggregating  probably  in  the  neighbor- 
hood of  the  sum  estimated  by  us  will  become  necessary  in 
the  near  future,  if  the  transportation  of  Los  Angeles  is  to 
keep  pace  with  the  growth  and  industrial  and  business  de- 
velopment of  the  city." 

22 


The  Southern  Pacific,  the  Salt  Lake  and  the  Pacific  Electric  have 
put  forward  a  much  heralded,  but  very  vaguely  and  indefinitely  de- 
scribed, design  known  as  "The  Titcomb  Plan,"  by  which  these  three 
railroads,  to  the  exclusion  of  the  Santa  Fe,  (the  only  other  remaining 
railroad)  desire  to  introduce  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal  for  them- 
selves alone;  and  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  this  working  arrange- 
ment between  these  three  railroads  is  in  effect  a  unified  terminal  for 
passenger  purposes,  and  when  taken  in  connection  with  the  requests  for 
additional  freight  and  team  yard  facilities  of  these  three  roads  closely 
approaches  a  unified  terminal  for  themselves  for  both  passengers  and 
freight.  This  working  arrangement,  if  it  could  be  carried  out,  would 
in  effect  be  a  union  terminal  for  three  of  the  four  roads  in  Los  An- 
geles, and  a  union  terminal  so  arranged  as  to  very  greatly  inconvenience 
the  fourth  road,  and  tie  a  fence  of  steel  rails  about  that  section  of  the 
City  and  effectually  prevent  the  entrance  therein  of  any  competitive 
carrier.  The  exact  cost  of  this  Titcomb  Plan  is  not  and  cannot  be- 
estimated  because  the  plan  has  never  been  fully  nor  accurately  explained 
by  words  or  diagrams,  and  there  seems  to  be  no  statement  in  existence 
as  to: — 

1st.     Just  what  "The  Titcomb  Plan"  proposes  to  do,  item  by  item; 

2nd.  If  permission  were  given  to  build  this  "Titcomb  Plan"  would 
the  railroads  obligate  themselves  to  build  such  design  and  set 
it  out  in  definite  and  specified  form; 

3rd.  How  the  cost  of  viaducts  and  street  adjustments  would  necessarily 
be  met  by  the  city. 

The  total  cost  estimate  of  the  Sachse  Plan  for  grade  crossing  elim- 
ination and  passenger  terminal  has  been  worked  out  by  Mr.  Sachse  and 
is  set  out  in  brief  on  page  15  as  a  total  of  $32,233,445.00,  on  the  basis 
of  the  prices  in  effect  during  1918;  and  we  believe  in  this  matter  of 
price  that  inasmuch  as  the  total  expenditure  of  $32,000,000  will  be 
spread  over  a  series  of  years  it  does  not  much  underestimate  what  in 
fact  will  be  the  total  cost;  and  the  more  so  because  we  have  considered, 
and  elsewhere  in  this  report  recommend,  that  careful  consideration  be 
given  to  the  elimination  of  certain  features,  and  to  readjustments  which 
will  lessen  the  costs  of  others. 

The  desirability  of  a  Union  Passenger  Station  and,  if  it  is  found 
advisable  to  build  such  a  station,  the  best  location  for  such  a  structure, 
with  its  attendant  utilities,  is  a  problem  at  once  simple  and  complex. 
Complex,  because  of  the  many  apparent  interests  involved;  but  ex- 
tremely simple  when  seen  from  a  point  of  view  far  enough  removed  to 
get  the  true  perspective  of  these  varying  interests,  eliminating  personal 
gain  or  pride,  and  going-  at  the  matter  strictly  from  the  point  of  view 
of  true  betterment  of  all  interests  concerned.  Here  again  reference 
should  be  made  to  the  listj  of  Points  of  View  given  in  the  Report  on 
page  10. 


The  confining  of  the  main  line  transportation  facilities  to  the  banks 
of  the  Los  Angeles  River  is  the  fundamental  basis  of  the  Sachse  Plan  for 
the  inseparable  "elimination  of  grade  crossings  and  building  of  a  union 
passenger  station."  The  deliberate  intent  of  the  Arcade  Plan  is  to  build 
a  viaduct  from  the  river  to  the  Arcade  and  thence  to  the  tracks  up  and 
down  Alameda  Street,  thus  forming  a  barrier  to  access  by  vehicles,  street 
cars  or  future  railroads  designing  to  reach  the  river  or  this  industrial  dis- 
trict or  to  effect  communication  between  Hovle  Heights  and  the  center 
of  the  city;  ami  this  is  one  phase  of  what  is  meant  by  saying  that  trans 
portation  facilities  should  be  confined  to  the  banks  of  the  Los  Angeles 
River.  We  must  not  so  encumber  the  banks  of  the  river  as  to  force  any 
of  the  transportation  lines  away  from  the  banks  in  order  to  get  around 
the  obstacles  we  build  on  the  banks;  and  a  Union  Passenger  Station  at 
the  Santa  Fe,  together  with  the  Santa  Fe  freight  facilities  and  the 
development  of  the  freight  facilities  of  the  other  carriers  thereby  forced 
towards  the  west,  would  be  almost  if  not  quite  as  effectual  a  barrier,  and 
a  departure  from  the  building  of  transportation  facilities  on  the  river, 
as  is  the  Titeomb  Plan  at  the  Arcade;  whereas  the  Plaza  Plan  effectually 
and  immediately  eliminates  from  the  river  bank  all  matters  which  are 
not  transportation,  confining  the  river  banks  to  the  use  and  development 
for  transportation  purposes  only  and  making  the  terminal  facilities,  which 
are  an  entirely  different  thing,  a  feature  of  an  isolated  unused  and  par- 
ticularly fitting  location,  excepting  only  that  the  Sachse  Plan  develops 
minor  antagonism  with  vehicles  and  street  cars,  which  antagonism  can 
be  wholly  eliminated  by  minor  adjustments. 

The  present  station  sites  in  the  city  of  Los  Angeles  can  be  kept  in 
service  only  by  immediate  expenditure  of  great  sums  of  money,  especially 
if  plans  for  grade  crossing  elimination,  now  so  well  worked  out,  are 
carried  into  effect.  The  Salt  Lake  road  is  under  necessity  of  making 
very  extensive  improvements  at  once,  and  if  the  main  line  tracks  are  to 
be  located  on  the  east  and  west  banks  of  the  river  the  present  Salt  Lake 
station  must  be  entirely  rebuilt  in  another  location,  and  the  Salt  Lake 
has  made  an  arrangement  with  the  Southern  Pacific  whereby  the  two 
have  formally  announced  their  desire  to  enter  a  Union  Station,  into  which 
they  also  propose  to  take  a  track  from  the  Pacific  Electric. 

The  Santa  Fe  railroad  is  under  the  necessity  of  making  extensive 
changes  in  its  station  and  station  yards,  which  at  the  present  time  are 
not  in  keeping  with  good  railroad  practice  in  a  city  of  the  importance  of 
Los  Angeles,  and  are  distinctly  below  the  standards  set  by  the  Santa  Fe 
in  much  less  important  cities.  The  Santa  Fe  Railroad  has  stated  its  case 
recently  by  its  attorney  before  the  Railroad  Commission,  and  heretofore 
by  statements  of  the  late  Mr.  Ripley  to  members  of  your  Advisory  Com- 
mittee, that  the  Santa  Fe  is  favorably  disposed,  upon  order  of  the  Kail- 
road  Commission,  to  entering  a  Union  Station  which  was  designed  for  the 
joint  and  equitable  use  of  all  the  using  railroads,  and  especially  designed 
for  the  development  of  future  traffic,  and  for  this  and  other  reasons  con- 
sider the  Plaza  site  preferable  to  the  Arcade  site. 

The  Southern  Pacific  is  facing  the  necessity  of  clearing  Alameda 
Street  from  the  continuous  and  dangerous  traffic  over  the  crossings  at 

24 


Third,  Fourth  and  Sixth  Streets  and  elsewhere,  and  must  therefore  expend 
a  great  amount  of  money  to  separate  the  grade  crossings  of  its  tracks 
and  the  streets  (see  page  23),  unless  it  is  able  to  land  upon  the  city  all 
or  the  greater  part  of  this  burden.  The  Alameda  Street  situation  is  fully 
set  out  in  the  Sachse  Eeport,  pages  193  to  215,  et  al. 

The  Pacific  Electric  has  talked  a  good  deal  about  changing  the  ap- 
proach to  its  Sixth  and  Main  Street  Station  in  such  way  that  all  .pas- 
sengers for  both  the  north  and  south  division  will  be  taken  directly  into 
the  Main  Street  Station  without  opportunity  to  leave  the  cars  along  the 
routes  entering  the  city.  This  is  forcing  its  passengers  to  enter  and  leave 
the  cars  in  conflicting  routes  on  the  one  station  already  crowded,  and  in 
a  section  of  the  city  also  crowded  by  general  street  traffic. 

' '  The  present  location  of  the  three  steam  railroads  with 
respect  to  one  another  is  such  that  they  could  easily  be 
brought  into  one  depjot:  that  is  to  say,  at  one  or  more  points, 
the  roads  are  close  enough  together  that  to  connect  them 
would  require  only  the  construction  of  short  connecting 
tracks.  This  is  in  contradistinction  to  the  situation  in  many 
other  cities,  where  the  roads  enter  from  different  points  of 
the  compass  and  where  the  main  lines  cannot  be  tied  together 
without  the  construction  of  connecting  tracks,  either  of  a 
considerable  length  or  through  expensive  property  or  by  sur- 
mounting topographical  difficulties."  (Sachse,  247-248.) 

A  similar  system  of  recommendation,  namely,  that  a  union  passenger 
terminal  was  indicated  for  Los  Angeles,  was  made  in  the  Bion  J.  Arnold 
report  and  in  the  report  of  the  engineers  of  the  Viaduct  Committee  above 
referred  to.  It  is  urged  in  the  following  words: — 

"These  requirements  (a  separation  of  grade  crossings)  of 
course  are  susceptible  to  but  one  interpretation,  namely,  that 
the  elimination  of  grade  crossings  by  other  than  industrial 
deliveries  and  the  maintenance  of  the  minimum  number  of 
such  grade  crossings  with  joint  use  of  trackage  means  a 
union  terminal  for  Los  Angeles,  both  passenger  and  freight, 
and  it  is  only  on  this  basis  that  the  dangers  of  railroad  grade 
crossings  can  be  avoided  and  minimized  and  the  best  in- 
terests of  the  city  at  large  and  the  railroads  themselves  can 
be  conserved." 

The  desirability  of  a  Union  Passenger  Station  has  been  examined  by 
Mr.  Sachse  with  great  care,  and  his  opinion  is  well  set  out  in  his  following 
conclusions: — 

"Taking  all  arguments  into  consideration  we  feel  con- 
vinced that  a  station  is  desirable,  provided  it  may  be  suit- 
ably located,"  (Sachse,  27.) 

25 


"After  a  most  exhaustive  consideration  of  all  arguments 
for  and  against  a  Union  Passenger  Station  in  Los  Angeles 
\\o  h:ive  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  establishment  of 
such  a  station  is  desirable,  both  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
public  and  from  the  standpoint  of  the  railroads,  that  the 
cost  is  justified,  and  that  the  project  can  be  financed." 
(Sachse,  13.) 

"We  believe  that  in  the  City  of  Los  Angeles,  more  than 
almost  any  other  city,  a  fine  union  passenger  terminal  is  not 
only  very  desirable,  but  almost  essential."  (Sachse,  247.) 

"In  Los  Angeles  public  necessity  and  convenience  re- 
quire the  establishment  of  a  Union  Passenger  Station." 
(Sachse,  250.) 

The  question  of  the  improvement  of  union  freight  terminals  requires 
a  somewhat  different  treatment,  because  both  the  Southern  Pacific  and 
the  Santa  Fe  are  proposing  to  construct  great  freight  yards  well  outside 
of  the  center  of  the  city,  and  all  the  roads  are  asking  for  additional 
facilities  for  delivering  less  than  carload  lots  of  freight;  and  it  is  the 
opinion  of  your  Committee  that  if  the  plan  is  carried  out  of  concen- 
trating the  main  lines  in  depressed  tracks  along  the  river  banks,  with 
low  viaducts  across  such  tracks  over  the  river,  and  if  a  union  passenger 
terminal  is  built  adequate  for  a  long  time  to  come,  that  we  may  then 
let  the  freight  situation  stand  in  abeyance  for  the  time  being,  with 
rather  the  tendency  to  grant  all  reasonable  requests  of  facilities  for 
delivering  less  than  carload  lots,  provided  that  care  is  taken  to  reduce 
and  ultimately  eliminate  all  freight  spurs  laying  longitudinally  in  the 
street;  but  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  at  all  times  that  everything  must 
be  done  to  prevent"  and  minimize  inconvenience,  and  especially  cost,  to 
the  shippers  and  to  the  railroads. 


26 


THE  LOCATION  OF  THE  UNION  PASSENGER  TERMINAL 

It  is  generally  and  publicly  conceded  by  all  parties  in  interest  (ex- 
cepting some  of  the  railroads)  that  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal  is 
desirable,  and  the  objecting  railroads  themselves  have  made  application 
for  a  Joint  Union  Terminal  to  be  entered  by  the  Southern  Pacific,  Salt 
Lake  and  Pacific  Electric.  Application  3346  is  the  formal  application 
of  record,  but  the  witnesses  for  the  railroads,  and  the  continuous  propa- 
ganda of  the  railroad  exponents,  has  greatly  amplified  this  scheme  and 
included  an  entrance  for  the  Pacific  Electric.  The  Pacific  Electric  has 
an  application  on  file  with  the  most  vehement  propaganda  to  support  it 
that  a  Union  Terminal  for  interurban  cars  is  absolutely  essential.  There- 
fore, we  take  it  as  an  accepted  fact  that  the  desirability  of  a  Union  Pas- 
senger Terminal  is  conceded  by  all,  however  much  its  detail  of  location 
and  design  are  disputed  by  some,  and  that  the  only  problem  is  where  this 
site  shall  be  chosen. 

The  site  for  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal  cannot  be  chosen  at  will, 
but  must  be  selected  after  a  thorough  knowledge  has  been  obtained  and 
classified  of  the  requirements  of  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal  in  area, 
accessibility  and  facilities. 

Mr.  Sachse  has  laid  down  the  rule  that  because  overland  trains  are 
now  frequently  13  cars  it  is  necessary  to  have  station  platforms  1000  feet 
long.  Yesterday  we  read  in  the  paper  that  the  Santa  Fe  was  bringing 
out  14-car  trains  from  Chicago,  and  their  witness  said  these  are  common. 
These  require  1200-foot  platforms,  and  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the 
certainty  of  electric  traction  will  lengthen  the  trains,  because  the  present 
experience  of  electric  traction  is  that  it  is  more  powerful  than  steam 
traction  and  that  longer  trains  are  more  convenient  and  cheaper  to 
operate.  This  means  that  the  station  platforms  must  be  from  1000  to 
1200  feet  long,  exclusive  of  the  space  needed  for  the  tracks  to  be  devel- 
oped from  the  throat  of  the  yard  up  to  these  several  platforms  and  onto 
other  service  tracks,  and  of  the  space  needed  for  platforms  and  station 
facilities,  including  passenger,  mail,  express  and  baggage, 

The  width  of  the  station  yard  is  determined  primarily  by  the  number 
of  platform  tracks,  which  in  good  practice  are  put  42  feet  between  cen- 
ters of  passenger  platforms,  with  a  double  track  between  platforms,  and 
these  double  tracks  13  feet  between  centers.  The  total  number  of  tracks 
needed  for  trains  tributary  to  Los  Angeles  depends  a  good  deal  upon  the 
amount  of  traffic  which  can  be  expected  to  occupy  the  station.  At  the 
present  time  the  three  main  trains  of  the  Southern  Pacific  are  sometimes 
running  a  total  of  eight  sections,  and  the  three  main  trains  of  the  Santa 
Fe  are  running  about  the  same,  and  we  are  concerned  not  with  the 
average,  but  with  the  greatest  number  that  ever  occurs.  We  must  add 
to  this  the  other  existing  trains  now  in  operation,  and  also  our  best 
estimate  of  the  probable  development  of  future  trains,  and  give  careful 
thought  to  what  is  to  occur  when  the  surety  of  electric  operation  of  the 
terminals  has  been  carried  into  effect.  Mr.  Hawgood  has  made  an  ex- 
tensive study  of  this  matter  and  concludes  that  the  number  of  trains 
figured  by  Mr,  Sachse,  shown  on  his  diagram,  (page  263),  is  in  error,  be- 

27 


cause  it  docs  not  take  due  account  of  the  effect  of  the  war  ;iml  of  the 
minced  operation  due  to  the  United  States  Kailroad  Administration. 
Mr.  Hawgood  computes  from  data  obtained  from  all  directions  that  the 
line  shown  on  the  Sachse  diagram,  (page  263),  and  marked  "Maximum 
Xiunlier  Through  Trains"  is  really  the  probable  number  of  main  line 
trains,  which  will  be  180  daily  in  1940,  or  twenty  years  from  now;  and 
that  these  trains  will  be  frequently  run  in  sections  and  other  engine 
movements  will  make  an  equivalent  of  200  trains  daily  in  1940.  Our 
table  on  page  19  shows  today  a  movement  of  169  trains  or  passenger 
engines  in  and  out  of  the  present  Arcade  Station.  The  best  engineering 
practice  seems  to  show  that  200  daily  trains,  taking  account  of  the  con- 
gestion of  the  morning  and  evening  hours,  call  for  from  17  to  20  tracks, 
with  a  4-traek  throat  and  4-track  approach.  This  amount  of  trackage 
calls  for  a  train  shed  having  platform  tracks  425  feet  wide  by  1200  feet 
long,  and  this  is  exclusive  of  the  area  needed  for  buildings,  development 
of  tracks  in  and  out  of  the  yard,  mail,  express,  private  car  or  other 
facilities.  The  probability  is  that  the  development  of  interurban  traffic 
by  electric  operation  will  greatly  increase  rather  than  decrease  the  traffic 
brought  into  the  Union  Passenger  Terminal. 

It  is  sufficient  in  this  instance  to  quote  from  the  Sachse  Report 
(page  274)  where  Mr.  Sachse  shows  that  a  stub  terminal  of  18  tracks, 
furnished  with  all  other  facilities,  will  be  sufficient: — 

"provided  that  the  throat  of  the  yard  is  fast  and  that  the 
coach  yard  and  mechanical  facilities  are  not  too  far  away; 
the  tracks  devoted  to  express  purposes  are  not  in- 
cluded in  this  number;" 

and  it  is  apparent  that  the  tracks  for  baggage,  mail  and  express  are  not 
included  in  this  estimate. 

In  all  the  discussions  of  rail  convenience  and  operations  of  a  pas- 
senger station  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  capacity  must  always 
be  adapted  to  the  maximum  load  of  trains  or  passengers  or  crowds  that 
it  may  be  called  upon  to  handle,  and  that  very  little  interest  can  be 
taken  in  an  average  capacity,  wTiether  it  be  by  the  hour  or  day;  so  that 
the  elaborate  explanations  of  the  Southern  Pacific  engineers  that  the 
Arcade  site  can  be  induced  to  accommodate  200  trains  per  day,  provided 
the  time  table  is  so  arranged  that  these  trains  enter  and  leave  exactly 
upon  the  hour  and  minute  of  the  time  table  so  arranged  as  to  bring  in  a 
second  train  exactly  as  the  first  leaves,  are  not  interesting  in  the  light  of 
the  known  irregularity  of  the  arrival  and  departure  of  trains  and  the 
known  requirement  that  each  important  train  is  running  in  several  sec- 
tions and  that  each  section  requires  several  independent  engine  movements 
in  and  out  of  the  station  before  that  section  is  finally  disposed  of. 

The  Sachse  Report  is  filled  with  requirements  of  a  passenger  ter- 
minal collected  in  some  places  into  lists,  such  as  the  General  List  on 
page  273,  and  also  the  list  of  Mail  Requirements  on  page  276,  and  the 
pros  and  eons  of  the  several  suggested  sites, — 

28 


Arcade— 284-288. 

Santa  Fe — 291-292. 

Plaza— 295-297. 

Electric — 110. 

Comparison  of  sites — 388. 

Eequirements  of  the  Terminal — 274-278. 

Engineering  Conference  Eeports. 

All  these  many  requirements,  and  many  others  which  have  been  fully 
established,  together  with  the  many  additional  suggestions  from  the  point 
of  view  of  the  public  using  the  station  from  one  end,  ,and  the  railroad 
using  the  station  from  the  other,  are  well  known  to  engineers  and  have 
been  more  or  less  fully  discussed  in  the  investigations  leading  up  to  the 
Sachse  Report  and  to  the  report  of  the  Engineering  Conference  and  this 
report.  We  are  now  fully  of  the  opinion  that  a  Union  Passenger  Ter- 
minal adequate  for  Los  Angeles  requires  an  immediate  area  500  feet  wide 
by  3000  feet  long,  with  a  certainty  of  needed  extension  in  width  and,  if 
convenient,  in  length. 

The  area  and  the  shape  of  the  station  grounds  having  been  roughly 
determined  by  the  above  system  of  calculation,  amplified  and  adjusted  by 
many  cross  references  in  the  Sachse  Report,  we  are  at  once  brought  face 
to  face  with  the  consideration  of  the  three  several  sites  proposed  in  the 
Sachse  Report;  with  due  regard  to  the  unofficial,  indefinite,  and,  we 
may  say,  inaccurate  lack  of  detail  surrounding  the  much  talked  about 
"Titcomb  Plan,"  which  is  in  the  nature  of  a  suggested  possible  ampli- 
fication of  the  Southern  Pacific  plan  set  out  in  the'ir  Application  3346, 
and  a  modification  or  amplification  of  the  Sachse  readjustment  of  the 
Southern  Pacific  plan  of  a  station  yard  as  set  out  by  diagram  on  page  341 
of  the  Sachse  Report.  We  have  omitted  from  this  discussion  given  in 
this  report,  but  by  no  means  from  our  consideration,  the  plans  proposed 
for  a  union  station  at  the  present  Santa  Fe  site,  and  we  omit  this  dis- 
cussion purposely  from  this  report  because  we  feel  that  the  Santa  Fe  site 
does  not  measure  up  to  requirements  emphatically  required  by  certain 
points  of  view  heretofore  mentioned. 

We  are  thus  brought  face  to  face  with  the  consideration  not  merely 
of  the  two  remaining  plans,  namely: — the  Plaza  Plan  and  The  Arcade 
Plan,  but  more  truly  to  the  consideration  of  these  plans  amplified  be- 
yond what  has  been  set  out  in  the  Saehse  Report  into  what  might  be 
called  the  possibilities  of  these  two  plans;  in  order  to  comply  with  the 
suggestion  of  the  Railroad  Commission  that  the  object  of  the  engineers' 
reports  was  to  promote  intelligent  discussion  so  that 

"the  recommendation  contained  in  the  report  shall  be  revised, 
and  that  finally  the  Commission  shall  make  its  decision  and  or- 
der." (Sachse,  20.) 

Certain  salient  features  mark  the  consideration  of  the  two  sites 
suggested.  At  the  north  end  of  the  city  we  have  the  proximity  of  all 
the  main  lines  of  the  steam  carriers,  together  with  the  entrance  of  the 
northern  division  of  the  electric  interurban  and  the  concentration  at 
cr  close  to  the  Plaza  of  all  the  northern,  eastern  or  western  suburban 
highways,  and  the  diagonal  entrance  into  the  same  neighborhood  of  the 

29 


city  streets,  milking  this  at  once  a  point  of  convenient  access  and 
distribution  for  all  the  interest.'  concerned;  and  we  are  materially  in- 
H ue need  "by  the  opinions  of  the  engineers  not  in  the  employ  of  the  rail- 
loads  who  have  given  this  matter  study,  that  the  north  end  of  the  city 
i»  at  once  and  clearly  the  proper  location  for  a  Union  Passenger  Termi- 
nal; and  the  acceptance  of  this  general  location  by  the  Santa  Fe  Rail- 
road as  against  the  Arcade  site  has  already  been  referred  to. 

In  considering  the  severance  of  the  eastern  part  of  the  city  (Boyle 
Heights)  from  the  center  and  western  part  of  the  city,  it  is  desirable 
to  stop  as  much  as  possible  the  passage  of  steam  trains  through  the 
intervening  territory,  and  this  again  leads  at  once  to  the  theory  of 
stopping  this  traffic  by  diverting  the  major  flow  into  a  northern  ter- 
n:inal;  and  this  is  particularly  true  in  relation  to  the  through  traffic  on 
Alameda  Street,  which,  the  report  of  the  Engineering  Conference  shows, 
can  be  entirely  stopped  if  the  suggestion  is  followed  of  actually  taking 
the  tracks  off  of  that  section  of  Alameda  Street  next  immediately  south 
of  the  proposed  Plaza  Terminal.  In  this  way  the  viaducts  across  the 
river  and  the  approaches  from  both  sides  will  reach  the  maximum  of 
attractiveness  and  be  an  asset  instead  of  eyesore  to  the  city,  with  an 
actual  reduction  of  the  cost  involved. 

The  building  of  any  terminal  near  the  center  of  the  city  at  once 
involves  the  difficulty  of  adequate  approach  without  grade  crossings 
and  the  difficulty  of  extension  when  the  inevitable  time  for  extension 
arrives.  The  cross  streets  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Arcade  station  require 
a  certain  amount  of  rearrangement  to  obtain  better  continuity,  and  the 
unconfirmed  proposition  of  the  ' '  Titcomb  Plan ' '  for  the  rearrangement 
of  Fourth  Street,  making  it  directly  north  of  the  present  building  of  the 
Ice  &  Cold  Storage  Company,  is  a  step  in  the  right  direction;  but  even 
this  rearrangement  of  Fourth  Street  renders  the  Arcade  area  available 
for  tracks,  facilities  and  buildings  a  total  length  of  2150  feet  by  a  width 
of  400  feet,  or  less  than  20  acres,  which  is  very  greatly  inadequate  for 
the  traffic  involved  and  to  be  involved  with  the  necessary  facilities 
adapted  to  the  needs  of  the  next  twenty  years;  and  we  feel  that  no  design 
is  worthy  of  considering  or  of  inaugurating  unless  it  contemplates  how 
it  is  to  be  increased  and  handled,  not  in  detail,  but  in  general  principles, 
for  the  next  forty  years. 

Both  the  ' '  Titcomb  Plan ' '  and  the  published  Southern  Pacific  plan 
call  for  an  elevated  steam  track  on  timber  trestle  from  the  river  bank  to 
the  station,  and  for  a  considerable  part  of  this  length  a  second  elevated 
track  high  above  the  steam  track,  on  which  third  story  the  electric  inter- 
urban  cars  will  operate,  and  from  which  it  is  proposed  that  these  cars 
shall  descend  by  .some  heretofore  unexplained  method  into  the  Arcade 
station  or  go  onward  to  the  second  story  of  the  Sixth  and  Main  station. 
The  northern  end  of  this  timber  trestle  is  at  Brooklyn  Avenue  and  Pacific 
Electric  right  of  way,  with  a  branch  from  Sixth  to  Fourteenth  at  Alameda 
Street,  and  another  from  Sixth  to  Fifth  Street  at  Alameda  Street,  and 
another  from  the  east  side  of  the  river  from  Sixth  to  Ninth  Street.  This 
is  a  total  of  about  24,000  feet,  (4y2  miles)  of  timber  trestle  through,  over, 
and  across  the  center  of  the  city.  To  state  these  facts  is  to  condemn  -this 
dangerous  monstrosity. 

30 


BASIS  OF  COMPARISON  OF  SITES 

In  the  comparison  of  one  site  with  another  and  of  one  station  build- 
ing with  another,  or,  in  fact,  in  making  any  comparison  between  definite 
possibilities  or  designs,  it  is  necessary  that  the  various  lists  of  require- 
ments obligatory  or  desirable,  and  the  various  lists  of  advantages  and 
disadvantages  of  the  several  sites  and  plans,  together  with  the  discussion 
of  such  matters  in  the  testimony  and  before  the  Engineering  Conference, 
should  be  collected  from  their  present  very  widely  scattered  and  some- 
times indefinite  statements  and  concentrated  in  the  mind  of  whoever  is 
making  the  comparison;  and  with  this  as  a  starting  point  all  comparisons 
must  pay  strict  regard  to  what  is  provided  or  omitted  and  to  what  is 
possible  or  impossible,  both  now  and  in  the  future,  from  all  the  several 
points  of  view  set  out  on  pages  10  and  11  and  the  requirements  referred 
to  on  page  29  of  this  report,  together  with  an  accurate  estimate  of  costs 
or  savings  involved  by  omitting  or  adding  the  various  items  one  by  one; 
and  it  can  be  at  once  seen  that  this  is  a  very  complex  technical  problem 
because  each  of  the  several  view  points  mentioned  has  a  tendency  to  lay 
more  stress  on  this,  that  or  the  other  supply  or  deficiency,  according  to 
the  personal  bias  of  the  mind  considering  the  matter.  A  glance  at  the 
various  reports  and  papers  filed  with  this  Advisory  Committee  by  the 
different  parties  or  organizations  who  have  given  the  matter  considera- 
tion shows  at  once  that  the  personal  convenience  of  the  parties  offering 
the  suggestion  rather  than  the  greatest  good  to  the  greatest  number,  or 
any  other  moral  and  business  measure,  has  sometimes  been  the  guiding 
element.  The  objections  filed  by  some  of  the  carriers  under  letter  of 
August  13,  1920,  copy  of  which  has  been  forwarded  to  this  Committee, 
are  in  almost  every  case  objections  to  elements  of  design  advised  by  the 
Engineering  Conference  from  the  point  of  view  of  convenience  to  the 
city  and  the  public  and  the  passengers,  on  the  ground  that,  without 
regard  to  the  merit  of  such  suggestions,  they  are  not  helps  to  the  financial 
profit  of  the  operating  roads.  This  is  a  very  clear  statement  of  the  view 
points  mentioned  in  Paragraph  2  on  Page  10.  Another  set  of  objections 
has  been  distance  to  certain  existing  hotels,  which  is  clearly  too  small  an 
element  to  be  considered  as  more  than  temporary. 

Your  Committee,  having  fully  accepted  the  principle  of  depressing 
the  tracks  along  the  river  bank  with  the  viaducts,  essentially  as  set  out 
in  the  Sachse  Eeport,  as  the  correct  solution  for  immediate  construction 
for  the  relief  of  grade  crossings,  and  having  accepted  as  an  essential  part 
of  this  system  of  grade  crossing  elimination  that  all  the  railroads  will 
therefore  be  required  to  enter  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal,  has  then  been 
confronted  by  the  single  problem  of  where  this  Terminal  can  best  be 
located,  and  in  this  way  has,  we  believe,  eliminated  all  personal  feeling 
in  respect  to  any  details  of  the  location  or  design. 

All  the  requirements  of  a  Union  Passenger  Station  which  have  been 
presented  or  inferred  or  denied  in  the  testimony  or  in  the  communica- 
tions presented  to  this  Committee  have  been  carefully  studied,  and  an 
estimate  has  been  made  to  determine  the  additional  costs  to  be  added  to 
either  of  the  two  sites  under  consideration,  in  order  that  both  sites  shall 
provide: — 

31 


1st.      The  same  facilities  at  the  present  time; 

2nd.     The  same  facilities  at  the  end  of  twenty  years; 

3rd.  Tho  same  apparent  possibilities  of  growth  along  tho  lines  in  which 
experience  has  shown  large  terminal  facilities  have  a  tendency  to 
expand. 

We  were  very  much  surprised  to  find  that,  given  the  same  facilities 
at  both  locations  at  the  present  moment,  the  cost  of  the  Plaza  location  is 
less  than  the  cost  of  the  Arcade  location,  with  the  further  suggestion  in 
the  testimony  of  Mr.  Sachse,  before  the  Commission,  that  if  it  should  be 
desirable,  a  material  lessening  of  the  Plaza  cost  could  be  introduced  in 
the  design  without  curtailment  of  the  facilities,  but  rather  by  readjust- 
ment of  certain  non-operative  features.  And  it  is  the  further  feeling  on 
the  part  of  your  Committee  that  Mr.  Sachse  suggests  in  his  testimony, 
rather  lightly  veiled,  a  hint  that  he  considers  it  possible  to  make  minor 
modifications  in  the  location  as  well  as  in  the  design  for  the  purpose  of 
eliminating  the  cost  of  certain  elements,  which  cost  he  believes  is  fully 
justified  for  the  "results  obtained,  but  which  cost  is  also  avoidable  by 
substituting  some  possibly  satisfactory  but  less  attractive  detail  of  both 
design  and  location. 

In  arriving  at  the  estimated  cost  of  the  Titcomb  Plan  in  comparison 
with  the  official  Southern  Pacific  Plan  we  were  hampered  because  no  com- 
plete design  has  been  submitted  of  the  "Titcomb  Plan,"  and  the  sketches 
and  details  in  the  printed  propaganda  are  extremely  indefinite: — 

1st.  As  to  what  are  the  structural  elements  of  the  Titcomb  design,  both 
in  general  and- in  detail,  of  location,  type  and  material; 

2nd.  Just  how  the  cost  of  these  several  structures  are  to  be  divided 
between  the  interested  parties,  including  the  city;  and, 

3rd.      Just  who  should  be  called  upon  to  pay  the  consequential  damages. 

Our  estimate  of  the  cost  has  been  made  by  using  the  unit  figures  prepared 
by  the  Joint  Engineering  Conference  and  used  by  the  Joint  Engineering 
Conference  in  arriving  at  the  cost  of  the  Sachse  plan  for  both  the  Arcade 
and  the  Plaza;  and  we  have  thus  prepared  for  our  own  use  an  estimate 
of  the  cost  of  providing  exactly  similar  facilities,  with  minor  modifica- 
tions due  to  the  differences  of  each  site,  and  so  we  have  arrived  at  our 
conclusion,  that  a  properly  constructed  Union  Passenger  Terminal,  with 
all  facilities  described  or  referred  to  in  the  Sachse  Report,  can  be  built  at 
the  Plaza  on  the  Sachse  location  or  on  a  slightly  modified  location,  for 
less  money,  immediate  and  future,  than  would  be  required  to  furnish  the 
same  facilities  on  the  Arcade  site,  either  by  amplifying  the  original 
Southern  Pacific  design  or  the  so-called  "Titcomb  Plan"  or  the  Sachse 
Arcade  design. 

The  Plaza  site  is  the  only  site  which  furnishes  a  fully  workable  coach 
yard  in  direct  contact  with  the  station  in  such  way  that  the  future 
growth  of  the  station  and  station  tracks  will  never  interfere  with  the 
coach  yard. 

32 


At  the  Arcade  site  it  will  always  be  necessary  that  engines  and 
empty  express  or  mail  cars  be  brought  into  the  station  and  out  again  over 
Alameda  Street,  as  at  present,  or  over  the  elevated  viaduct  from  the  east 
side  of  the  river  and  the  coach  yards  to  be  built  thereon  more  than  a 
mile  away  and  over  tracks  already  crowded. 

After  due  and  careful  consideration  of  each  and  all  and  every  of  the 
suggestions  that  have  been  put  before  us  both  by  interested  parties  and 
by  disinterested  parties,  by  parties  representing  one  interest  or  the  other, 
we  have  come  to  the  following  conclusions: — 

1st.  That  the  Arcade  project  as  set  out  in  the  application  of  the  South- 
ern Pacific  and  as  amplified  by  the  verbal  explanations  of  the 
witnesses  and  propagandists  of  "The  Titcomb  Plan,"  is  wholly 
inadequate  to  the  needs  of  Los  Angeles  because  of  the  retention  of 
tracks  along  or  across  important  streets,  of  deficient  area,  distance 
from  train  facilities,  inadequate  accessibility  by  vehicles  and  street 
cars,  and  the  inability  to  cure  these  defects  at  any  cost  apparently 
within  the  realms  of  possibility; 

2nd.  The  scheme  as  presented  for  the  development  of  the  Arcade  site 
can  be  compared  with  the  schemes  presented  for  the  Union  Pas- 
senger Terminal  at  the  Plaza  in  respect  to  cost  only  after  similar 
facilities,  now  and  hereafter,  are  provided;  which  is  very  far  from 
being  the  case  of  the  designs  as  now  presented  to  the  public;  and 
in  this  matter  particular  reference  is  made  to  the  Appendix  to  this 
report  prepared  by  Mr.  Hawgood,  setting  forth  in  somewhat  more 
technical  terms  the  basis  of  comparison  of  the  two  sites,  by  which 
it  is  shown  that  similar  utilities  at  the  Arcade  will  cost  more  than 
at  the  Plaza;  and, 

3rd.'  It  is  our  opinion  that  the  facilities  furnished  at  the  Plaza  are  much 
superior  from  every  point  of  view  than  the  more  expensive  costs 
at  the  Arcade. 

It  is  of  course  clear  that  there  will  continue  to  be  competition  be- 
tween the  several  carriers  as  to  trains  connecting  with  common  points, 
and  that  therefore  trains  and  sections  of  trains  with  light  engine  move- 
ments will  tend  to  concentrate  and  congest  the  station,  at  certain  times, 
and  that  the  greater  the  intensity  of  traffic  due  to  excursions  or  other- 
wise, the  greater  will  be  this  irregularity  and  the  greater  the  congestion; 
and  that  it  is  our  duty  now  to  anticipate  a  certain  amount  of  this  and 
see  that  the  design  of  the  station  and  its  possible  extensions  is  such  that 
it  can  grow  as  these  difficulties  grow;  and  this  presupposes  that  certain 
tracks  in  the  station  will  to  some  degree  be  allotted  to  the  several  carriers 
in  order  that  overlaps  or  irregularities  in  their  train  schedules  and  train 
operations  will,  in  the  least  possible  degree,  cause  inconvenience  between 
one  carrier  and  another. 

A  very  important  element  to  be  considered  in  all  terminal  study  in 
Los  Angeles  is  the  certainty  of  ultimate  electric  operation  of  all  terminal 
facilities,  both  passenger  and  freight,  and  the  opportunity  so  furnished 

33 


for  much  more  intimate  contnc-t  between  the  Union  Terminals  and  the 
districts  and  industries  to  be  served,  both  passenger  and  freight,  than  can 
be  carried  out  under  steam  and  mixed  operation.  The  Plaza  station  lends 
itself  to  an  elongated  or  circuit  terminal  by  surface  or  subway  better 
than  any  other  location  suggested.  It  is  clear  that  the  subway  will  be 
not  for  vehicles  or  local  cars,  but  for  interurban  and  main  line  cars, 
with  such  portions  of  the  local  cars  as  have,  for  that  district  at  least, 
outgrown  their  local  character  and  become  suburban  or  interurban. 
(Page  46.)  In  other  words,  the  subway  must  be  planned  and  operated  so 
that  stops  will  not  be  made  at  every  crossing  street,  but  only  at  certain 
fixed  intervals  of  several  blocks,  as  has  been  universally  the  practice 
wherever  subways  are  employed.  And  we  must  recognize  that  this  inter- 
urban  traffic  is  the  feeding  line,  both  of  passenger  and  freight,  for  the 
steam  carriers,  and  that  the  present  Pacific  Electric  has  practically  be- 
come the  sole  system  of  local  trains  feeding  Los  Angeles,  because  the 
local  trains  of  the  steam  carriers  are  rapidly  becoming  less  and  less  and 
give  promise  of  prompt  extinction,  whereas  the'interurban  traffic  is  in- 
creasing by  leaps  and  bounds,  and  is  held  back  only  by  inadequate 
development;  so  that  its  excess,  not  now  taken  care  of  in  the  interurban 
cars,  is  struggling  for  entrance  into  the  city  over  the  many  lines  of 
interurban  busses  and  privately  owned  automobiles  and  the  many  trucks 
of  freight  that  daily  enter  and  leave  the  city;  and  we  are  forced  to 
believe  that  this  interurban  traffic,  or  suburban  traffic,  or  traffic  between 
one  end  and  the  other  of  our  much  elongated  city,  will  very  greatly 
increase  with  the  development  of  the  harbor  district  and  the  development 
of  the  suburban  districts,  which,  by  annexation  to  Los  Angeles  and  the  use 
of  Owens  Eiver  water,  are  certain  to  make  great  strides  forward  in  popu- 
lation, with  its  attendant  transportation,  both  freight  and  passenger, 
whenever  that  traffic  facility  is  furnished.  For  all  these  reasons  it  is 
clear  that  the  interurban  and  suburban  traffic  must  have  simple  -and 
prompt  circulation  through  a  circuit  system,  on  one  part  of  which  shall 
be  the  main  passenger  station's  and  the  main  freight  stations  of  the  main 
line  carriers,  and  we  feel  that  this  system  is  best  met  by  a  Union  Pas- 
senger Station  at  the  north  end  of  the  city. 

The  present  volume  of  the  Pacific  Electric  business  .it  the  loot  oi  the 
Pacific  Electric  incline  in  San  Pedro  Street  near  Sixth  Street  is  such  that 
incoming  southern  division  trains  and  outgoing  northern  division  trains 
pass  over  the  frog  at  the  grade  crossing  of  these  two  tracks  during  the 
rush  hours  with  intervals  sometimes  as  close  as  fifteen  seconds,  and  fre- 
quently trains  have  to  wait  until  the  train  ahead  has  cleared  this  frog; 
in  addition  to  which  incoming  trains  of  the  southern  division  and  the 
incoming  trains  of  the  northern  division  have  to  get  into  step  with  each 
other  on  the  track  rising  on  the  incline  to  the  station.  This  is  the  present 
condition  with  the  present  restricted  traffic  of  the  Pacific  Electric,  and 
at  a  point  similar  to  the  arrangement  proposed  in  the  ' '  Titcomb  Plan ' ' 
for  the  passage  of  all  electric  trains  and  cars  of  the  northern  and  southern 
division;  whereas,  at  the  present  time,  a  material  amount  of  traffic  is 
delivered  through  the  Main  Street  entrance  to  the  station.  These  figures 
are  based  upon  actual  count,  and  for  the  purpose  of  this  study  time  tables 

34 


or  theoretical  averages  per  hour  or  per  day  are  of  no  importance,  because 
the  critical  capacity  of  the  proposed  system  is  its  capacity  at  the  time 
of  the  greatest  rush  that  may  come  to  it  in  the  time  of  crowded  excur- 
sions; and  since  this  present  arrangement  is  already  overcrowded  to  the 
point  of  frequently  delaying  trains,  it  is  clear  that  it  is  wholly  unsatis- 
factory for  expensive  construction  because  it  is  not  adapted  to  carry  the 
constantly  increasing  loads  of  the  future. 

The  future  development  of  interurban  traffic,  including  suburban  ears 
in  Los  Angeles,  will  call  for  a  circuit  subway,  although  it  is  not  clear 
just  when  this  subway  will  be  necessary.  It  will  surely  result  in  a  great 
development  of  business  whenever  built,  and  therefore  is  justifiable  as 
a  plan  to  be  worked  out  at  once.  The  cost  of  this  subway  is  no  part 
whatever  of  the  solution  of  steam  terminal  needs,  but  rather  a  part  of  an 
increased  development  of  the  interurban  system,  which  merely  happens  as 
a  coincidence  to  be  owned  by  one  of  the  steam  lines,  and  for  which  it 
serves  as  the  most  important  feeder,  both  passenger,  express  and  freight. 


STREET  TRAFFIC  AT  THE  UNION  TERMINAL 

In  locating  the  new  Terminal  at  or  adjoining  the  Plaza  we  have 
given  a  great  deal  of  thought  to  the  showing  in  the  Sachse  Report  of  the 
existing  and  future  traffic  over  the  streets  in  that  neighborhood,  and  also 
have  studied  very  carefully  all  that  has  been  said  or  written  about  the 
city  or  suburban  traffic  which  will  tend  now  or  hereafter  to  How  past  the 
vicinity  of  the  Pla/a;  and  we  feel  that  the  Sachse  Plan  takes  adequate 
account  of  the  streams  of  street  traffic  which  now  exist,  together  with 
the  alteration  of  such  traffic  that  will  occur  as  time  goes  on  and  as  the 
freight  shipping  facilities  of  the  northern  end  of  the  city  give  place  to 
the  more  purely  passenger  facilities.  (Sachse,  99  to  118,  300,  386,  et  al.) 
The  opening  of  Alhambra  Avenue,  which  we  have  elsewhere  (page  — ) 
in  this  report  stated,  is  an  important  part  of  the  Plaza  plan,  and  the 
building  of  the  New  Plaza  and  the  Broadway  Sub-Tunnel,  etc.,  furnish 
opportunities  for  the  readjustment  of  the  main  arteries  of  vehicle  traffic 
in  the  vicinity  of  the  Plaza,  along  the  lines  of  the  civic  betterment 
organizations  already  mentioned,  and  others,  and  along  the  lines  dis- 
cussed at  the  Engineering  Conference,  to  a  greater  and  better  degree  and 
better  adapted  to  continuous  development  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Plaza 
than  elsewhere,  and  will  always  tend  to  develop  city  and  suburban  traffic 
in  such  way  as  to  feed  it  more  uniformly  and  regularly  to  its  desired 
destinations  without  congestion  than  can  ever  be  the  case  with  any  of 
the  other  sites  considered. 

We  must  always  endeavor  to  increase  the  attractiveness  of  Los 
Angeles  as  a  business  center  as  well  as  a  residential  city,  not  merely  to 
obtain  permanent  residents  coming  to  us  from  outside  cities,  but  also  as 
a  daily  place  of  business  for  what  we  have  hardly  yet  started  to  develop, 
namely, — a  thickly  settled  commuters'  suburban  residential  district,  with 
a  series  of  towns  or  cities  ranging  around  us  and  extending  to  the  limit 
of  highspeed  electric  or  automobile  transportation. 

The  more  closely  we  analyze  the  map  and  the  very  enlightening 
traffic  studies  contained  in  the  Sachse  Report,  the  more  thoroughly  we 
are  convinced  that  the  Plaza  plan,  together  with  the  readjustment  of 
streets  proposed  in  the  Sachse  Report  and  by  the  Engineering  Conference 
and  the  other  changes  suggested,  is  more  than  able  to  furnish  a  con- 
tinuously growing  and  improving  method  of  handling  the  traffic  to, 
through,  and  about  the  north  end  of  the  city  and  the  Plaza  Station. 

As  to  the  sentimental  point  involved  in  the  use  of  the  Plaza  by  a 
public  utility,  we  must  bear  in  mind  that  the  present  Plaza  does  no  more, 
if  at  all,  than  touch  the  area  occupied  by  the  original  Plaza.  (See  page  43.) 


36 


TABLE  ON  PAGE  388  (SACHSE  REPORT)  FOR  "WEIGHING 
OF  IMPORTANT  FACTORS" 

On  page  388  of  the  Sachse  Report  there  is  a  table  which  has  led  to 
very  great  controversy,  varying  from  enthusiastic  support  to  -trivial 
ridicule,  according  to  the  point  of  view  of  the  speaker.  We  attach  great 
weight  to  this  table  for  its  showing  as  a  whole,  but  only  after  regrouping 
the  various  headings  into  a  simpler  and  more  easily  grasped  statement. 

We  have  already  referred  to  the  many  requirements  and  desirable 
elements.  (See  page  29.)  A  full  knowledge  of  these,  as  possessed  by  or 
absent  from  one  or  another  or  each  and  all  of  the  sites,  is  necessary  to 
the  exercise  of  fair  and  unbiased  judgment,  and  yet  each  and  all  of  these 
various  requirements  are  colored  by  the  point  of  view  of  each  contestant 
so  frequently  referred  to  in  this  report  and  set  out  on  page  10.  If  we 
are  to  judge  the  comparison  of  sites  solely  from  the  one  single  stand- 
point we  must  necessarily  get  a  different  decision  than  if  we  consider 
them  from  any  other  side  of  the  circle  of  requirements.  The  adaptability 
from  the  railroad  standpoint  and  the  adaptability  from  the  city  stand- 
point may  not  be  at  all  alike,  and  yet  must  necessarily  have  many  points 
in  common;  so  that  the  various  elements  of  comparison  given  in  Mr. 
Sachse 's  table,  (Page  388)  may  be  divided  in  the  following  alphabetically 
arranged  descriptive  groups: — 

Accessibility. 
Adequacy. 
City  Planning. 
Freight  Facilities. 
General  Considerations. 
Grade  Crossing  Elimination. 
Operation  of  Trains. 
Rapid  Transit. 

Mr.  Sachse  has  sub-divided  these  groups  into  a  number  of  sub-headings, 
as,  for  instance,  Accessibility  is  divided  into  the  following  several 
heads: — 

"   3 — Adaptability  to  ultimate  rapid  transit; 

"   8 — Accessibility  by  surface  lines; 

"   9 — Adaptability  to  baggage,  mail  and  express  collection 

and  distribution; 

"12 — Convenience  to  hotel  and  business  district; 
"13 — Accessibility  by  automobile; 
"15 — Results  to  freight  draying;" 

whereas  he  has  not  divided  City  Planning  into  any  heads;  and  then  to 
these  several  classes  he  has  given  the  proportional  weight,  as  follows: — 


Total  weight  of  all  factors  used  in  comparing  sites,  assumed 
as  100%; 

Weight  of  City  Planning-  11%%; 

Accessibility,  in  its  several  subdivisions — 27% ; 

Value  and  adaptability  of  Plaza  Site  is  152%  of  Arcade  Site. 

We  have  regrouped  this  table  on  pages  388-9,  as  above  outlined, 
giving  to  the  several  features  the  weights  and  ratings  we  believe  correct, 
and  obtain  the  following  percentage  results: — 


Alphabetical 
Grouping 

•%of 
Importance 

Relative  Values  in  %  of  Total 

Plaza  Site 

Arcade  Site 

%of 
Total  Value 

%  of  Value 
at 
Plaza  Site 

%of 
Total  Value 

Accessibility  ........ 

16.4 

21.4 
8.6 
7.9 
8.6 

711 
7.1 
22.9 

15.9 

23.2    ' 
9.3 
8.5 
9.1 

6.2 
6.2 
21.6 

92 

50 
60 
89 
37 

50 
85 
70 

14.9 

11.6 
5.6 
7.6 
3.3 

3.1 
5.25 
15.1 

Adequacy  of  Area 
and  Shape  

City  Planning  

Freight  Facilities  
General  

Grade  Crossing 
Elimination  

Rapid  Transit  

Train  Operation  .... 

Total  

100. 

Relative  Value.  . 

100% 

66.4% 

Value  of  Plaza  Site  is  151%  of  Arcade  Site 


If  the  above  table  is  regrouped  on  purely  selfish  transportation  fea- 
tures by  omitting  items  3,  5  and  6,  the  totals  come  out  as  follows:— 

Plaza  Site— Eelative  Value,  100%  or  140%  of  Arcade  Site; 
Arcade  Site — Eelative  Value,  72%. 


38 


Whichever  of  the  stated  angles  of  view  is  taken  the  Plaza  Site  shows 
a  very  great  preponderance  of  advantages  over  all  other  sites,  even  with 
almost  arbitrary  differences  of  personal  opinion  adapted  to  the  further- 
ance of  this,  that  or  the  other  selfish  desire  of  the  proposer.  This  tabu- 
lation is  intended  to  show  merely  the  relative  value  of  the  several  designs 
in  their  fulfillment  of  the  requirements  of  a  Union  Passenger  Terminal, 
or,  in  commercial  parlance,  "the  ability  to  deliver  the  goods."  The 
detail  of  cost  is  elsewhere  set  out;  it  is  sufficient  to  say  here  that  the 
result  of  our  studies  is  that  with  equal  facilities  being  provided  on  the 
several  sites  the  Plaza  is  in  first  cost  and  in  ultimate  cost  the  cheaper, 
irrespective  of  the  fact  that  delivery  of  the  goods  (meeting  of  the  re- 
quirements) and  the  quality  of  the  goods  themselves  is  better  at  the 
Plaza  than  elsewhere.  It  is  perfectly  clear,  for  instance,  that  adequacy 
of  site  is  an  absolute  essential,  without  which  no  project  is  worthy  of  a 
moment's  consideration. 

The  question  of  adequacy  of  the  site  for  the  Union  Passenger  Ter- 
minal rests  mainly  on  the  question  of  how  far  ahead  should  we  forecast 
the  needs  of  the  transportation  and  the  needs  of  the  terminal  facilities 
in  Los  Angeles,  and  this  must  be  subdivided  into  how  much  of  the  design 
we"  shall  build  immediately  and  how  much  of  the  design  we  shall  postpone 
for  later  construction. 

We  agree  with  Mr.  Sachse,  and  with  other  engineers  who  have  studied 
the  project,  that  in  planning  for  the  terminal  facilities  of  Los  Angeles  we 
must  prepare  a  scheme  of  development  which  can  be  begun  now  and  go 
on  growing  for  many  years  to  come,  and  that  we  must  not  hedge  any 
part  of  the  city  with  a  ring  of  steel  inside  of  or  outside  of,  or  across 
which,  we  have  strangled  opportunities  of  growth.  We  believe  that  it 
is  proper  for  the  scheme  to  contemplate  a  design  of  terminal  facilities  for 
a  great  many  years  to  come  with  fairly  definite  main  elements  of  this 
development  for  fifty  years,  and  with  an  absolute  requirement  of  sufficient 
construction  for  twenty  years  after  the  first  general  construction  has  been 
completed. 

The  forecast  given  in  tha  report,  by  design  and  description,  pages 
261  et  seq.,  and  scattered  about  here  and  there  through  many  parts  of 
the  report,  is  stated  at  not  less  than  twenty  years,  with  the  suggestion 
that  this  is  a  minimum  figure,  but  that  the  same  type' and  character  of 
growth  may  be  expected  to  go  on  afterwards.  In  this  we  concur  excepting 
that  we  consider  that  the  growth  of  the  interurban  passengers  of  trans- 
portation systems  and  elongated  or  circular  subways  will  be  a  most  im- 
portant factor  in  the  proper  development  of  the  city  and  is  closely  asso- 
ciated with  questions  now  under  discussion;  and  we  believe  further  that 
the  calculation  of  the  number  of  through  trains  set  out  on  page  263  is 
seriously  in  error  because  it  gives  undue  weight  to  the  schedules  of  the 
United  States  Railroad  Administration  and  to  the  effect  of  war  condi- 
tions so  very  noticeable  in  our  western  traffic,  and  does  not  give  due  con- 
sideration to  electric  operation  of  main  lines  and  terminals  and  to  the 
operating  of  trains  in  sections  and  as  special  trains.  For  these  and  other 
"reasons  we  are  adopting  the  conclusions  of  the  Engineering  Conference 

39 


sot  out  on  Page-  K>  of  tin-  Suli Commit  toi' 's  report  on  a  Union  Passenger 
Terminal,  as  follows: — 

"It  is  the  sense  of  the  majority  of  this  Committee  that  in 
designing  a  Union  Passenger  Depot  for  Los  Angeles  the  capacity 
be  based  on  a  minimum  of  150  trains  per  day  by  the  end  of  the 
year  1930,  200  trains  per  day  by  the  end  of  the  year  1940, ' ' 

these  being  time  table  or  schedule  trains  which  must  be  increased  :n 
number  to  correspond  with  light  engine  movement,  coach  movements 
and  trains  operating  in  sections.  In  making  this  recommendation  we  have 
before  us  the  protest  of  the  Southern  Pacific  et  al  under  date  of  August 
1:1.  1920,  wherein  they  state  that  their  representatives  (members  of 
the  Engineering  Conference)  did  not  take  part  in  the  discussion  of  these 
subjects  at  the  Conference,  nor  hear  the  discussions,  nor  vote  thereon, 
and  now  wish  to  register  a  delayed  vote  against  the  above  statement  of 
requirements  as  to  general  design,  time  limits,  and  train  capacities;  but 
we  still  adhere  to  our  findings,  with  due  regard  to  the  difference  between 
working  out  a  plan  capable  of  future  growth  and  working  out  a  plan 
incapable  of  future  growth,  with  respect  to  immediate  and  future  obtain- 
ing of  property  and  the  building  of  improvements  now  and  hereafter, 
because  the  very  object  of  this  protest  seems  to  carry  with  it  strong 
reasons  for  our  conclusions  above  stated. 

The  acquisition  of  any  site  which  would  in  a  comparatively  short 
time  prove  inadequate  for  traffic  demands,  arid  which  would  not  furnish 
a  simple  and  pre-arranged  system  of  expansion,  would  prove  a  serious 
and  costly  error.  The  City  of  Los  Angeles  has  vigorously  entered  into 
the  manufacturing  field  and  the  development  of  its  harbor,  with  the 
consequent  development  of  its  city  and  suburban  districts.  It  is  emerging 
from  its  infancy  into  the  principal  city  of  the  Pacific  and  one  of  the  first 
ten  cities  of  the  United  States,  and  we  must  take  a  broad  view  of  the 
terminal  requirements  of  such  a  metropolis;  and  the  exercise  of  common 
prudence,  in  a  business  sense,  means  provisions  for  future  expansion  along 
the  lines  of  past  experience  here  and  elsewhere.  The  only  sound  policy 
is  to  build  for  the  immediate  future,  step  by  step,  along  the  integral 
parts  of  an  ultimate  plan;  as  has  been  so  fully  set  out  in  the  general 
requirements  adopted  in  codified  form  by  the  Engineering  Conference 
Committee  and  set  out,  as  previously  stated  in  many  parts  of  the  Sachse 
Report.  (See  list,  this  report,  Pages  19  et  al.) 

Los  Angeles  has  established  the  general  principle  that  for  the  city  of 
Los  Angeles  and  for  separating  grade  crossings  the  streets  will  rise  and 
pass  over  the  rails  by  a  system  of  viaducts,  excepting  in  single  exceptional 
cases,  and  has  now  announced  itself  most  forcibly  in  favor  of  the  sch-eme 
so  logically  adopted  by  all  the  engineers,  that  in  addition  to  the  raising 
of  streets  by  viaducts  there  shall  be  a  corresponding  lowering  of  the 
tracks,  so  as  to  physically  prevent  grade  crossings.  (See  pages  11,  12,  13,) 
This  type  of  separation  being  now  firmly  established  and  partially  built, 
it  becomes  at  once  an  element  which  will  rapidly  end  in  irrepressible 

40 


conflict  if  we  permit  any  crossings  of  main  thoroughfares  by  elevated 
railroad  tracks,  and  certainly  it  will  multiply  this  danger  very  greatly  if 
we  pile  on  top  of  this  elevated  steam  viaduct  a  still  higher  viaduct  carry- 
ing electric  cars,  and  then  at  some  later  time  endeavor  to  pass  through 
this  almost  military  entanglement  an  unobstructed  line  of  traffic  for  a 
future  street  or  future  railroad.  This  same  method  of  reasoning,  as 
to  the  principles  laid  down  for  the  separation  of  grades  in  Los  Angeles, 
namely, — that  railroad  viaducts  must  not  cross  important  streets,  but 
that  the  important  streets  shall  be  carried  over  the  tracks  on  viaducts; 
precludes  serious  contemplation  of  a  two-story  or  three-story  treminal 
anywhere  in  Los  Angeles  having  any  similarity  to  the  Grand  Central 
Station  in  New  York,  and  thus  carries  with  it  the  requirement  that  what- 
ever site  is  located  now  shall  be  capable  of  full  and  adequate  expansion 
as  time  goes  on. 


CITY  PLANNING. 

The  element  of  city  planning,  city  pride,  architectural  effect  and 
development  of  a  civic  center,  has  been  referred  to  a  great  deal  in  all 
discussions,  and  is  a  feature  in  the  Sachse  Report,  but  as  much  in  one 
station  as  in  another.  The  Sachse  Report  sets  forth  a' design  of  station 
copied  from  the  station  at  Washington,  D.  C.,  and  sets  forth  some  details 
of  location  and  construction  which  Mr.  Sachse  says  are,  in  his  opinion, 
fully  justified  by  the  importance  and  opportunities  of  the  city  of  Los 
Angeles.  In  that  opinion  we  agree.  He  has  not  overstepped  the  mark, 
and  the  amount  of  money  which  he  estimates  as  desirably  spent  along 
these  lines  is  not  excessive;  but  we  are  satisfied  that  if  it  should  be  the 
desire  of  all  parties  concerned  to  carry  out  the  principles  of  the  Sachse 
Design  for  the  Plaza  location  that  Mr.  Sachse  hnmself  could  incorporate 
these  principles  into  a  cheaper  construction,  even  though  he  feels  that 
the  importance  of  the  problem  and  the  opportunities  justify  the  figures  he 
has  given. 

The  best  city  planning  and  civic  development  is  as  well  determined 
in  its  principles  as  any  other  department  of  engineering,  but  is  not  as  well 
known  to  the  public,  merely  because  it  is  a  branch  of  engineering  having 
but  a  very  limited  practice,  and  therefore  its  principles  have  not  been 
well  codified  in  text  books  and  pamphlets,  but  are  scattered  over  a  very 
much  greater  list  of  writings. 

One  of  the  first  principles  of  city  planning  is  that  the  various  zones 
or  districts  of  the  city  should  be  well  segregated,  and  yet  must  be  con- 
nected by  thoroughfares  of  traffic  inherent  to  each  district;  and  this 
leads  to  the  combination  of  circular  and  radical  thoroughfares  so  beauti- 
fully illustrated  as  a  part  of  the  original  design  of  Washington,  D.  C.,  and 
as  a  part  of  the  reconstruction,  at  tremendous  expense,  of  cities  like 
London  and  Paris.  A  central  park  or  plaza,  surrounded  by  the  public 
buildings,  so  well  worked  out  in  San  Francisco,  or  a  long  avenue  or  boule- 
vard, which  is  the  more  common  type  of  development,  is  at  once  adapted 
to  a  selection  of  sites  and  agricultural  features  and  local  transporta- 
tion facilities  adapted  to  the  class  of  people  who  frequent  these  utilities, 
and  who  are  distinct  from  the  type  of  traffic  belonging  to  wholesale 
or  manufacturing  districts.  It  has  been  proposed  that  Los  Angeles 
should  develop  a  civic  center  along  the  lines  suggested  above,  but  a  good 
many  of  the  proponents  of  these  schemes  have  been  influenced  by  the 
ownership,  either  by  themselves  or  associates,  or  the  city,  or  by  the  lack  of 
'  such  ownership,  into  an  attempt  to  develop  this  or  that  or  the  other  parti- 
cular site  because  of  its  expediency  or  profit,  thus  endeavoring  to  deflect 
a  general  principle  well  understood  by  all  students  of  city  planning  into 
an  argument  in  favor  of  one  or  another  preconceived  scheme.  Your 
Committee  has  frequently  checked  itself  from  this  method  of  reasoning, 
which  is  along  the  lines  of  the  least  resistance  and  insisted  upon  an  un- 
prejudiced survey  of  what  the  city  needs,  from  the  point  of  view  of  all 
its  several  interests,  but  with  proper  regard  to,  and  yet  not  over-estimat- 
ing, the  desires  of  the  individual  interests  involved.  It  is  of  the  utmost 
importance  that  when  the  city  of  Los  Angeles  undertakes  to  carry  out 

42 


a  plan  for  the  betterment  of  the  city,  the  development  of  a  civia  center 
and  city  planning,  that  it  be  a  well  thought  out  and  far-sighted  plan  along 
the  strongest  and  broadest  lines  and  be  consistent  with  the  proper  cost 
of  the  results  to  be  obtained. 

Certain  sentimental  elements  must  always  enter  city  planning,  and  if 
the  existing  Plaza  in  front  of  the  Old  Church  had  been  the  original 
Plaza,  or  the  central  plot  around  which  the  Spanish  Pueblo  was  laid  out, 
there  might  be  a  certain  weight  given  to  that  sentiment.  The  present 
Plaza  does  not  occupy  one  foot  of  the  area  of  the  original  Plaza,  the  ex- 
treme southeasterly  corner  of  which  was  at  about  the  extreme  northwest; 
erly  corner  of  the  present  Plaza,  extending  well  behind  the  Old  Church, 
which,  by  the  way,  is  not  and  was  not  a  Mission  Church.  It  has  been 
stated  by  the  propagandists  that  conditions  of  the  grant  and  dedication 
of  the  Plaza  on  September  4,  1781,  prohibit  its  use  for  railroad  purposes; 
which,  in  view  of  the  date,  1781,  long  before  the  building  of  the  first  rail- 
road, seems  a  most  extraordinary  foresight  on  the  part  of  the  dedicators; 
and  even  so,  the  march  of  modern  conditions  has  frequently  called  for 
the  alteration  and  readjustment  of  restrictions  of  original  grants;  besides 
which,  as  we  have  just  stated,  the  present  Plaza  is  not  the  original  Plaza, 
the  present  Church  (for  which  a  considerable  part  of  the  funds  was  raised 
by  the  padres  operating  a  retail  brandy  shop)  was  not  a  Mission  Church; 
and  the  hysteric  cry  to  leave  undisturbed  what  is  not  the  relic  of  a  his- 
toric past,  is  somewhat  far-fetched  and  visionary,  especially  when  put 
forward  by  and  to  perpetuate  competitive  systems  of  terminals  as  re- 
quested by  one  group  of  railroads  in  Los  Angeles. 

With  the  sustaining  of  the  power  of  the  Railroad  Commission  as  a  trib- 
unal fully  authorized  to  investigate  and  to  issue  enforceable  orders,  and 
with  due  regard  to  this  change  of  conditions  and  the  growth  of  interur- 
ban  business  and  other  changes,  we  desire  to  include  as  a  part  of  this 
report  the  principles  ably  elucidated  by  Mr.  Bion  J.  Arnold  and  Mr.  C. 
M.  Robinson,  but  care  must  be  taken  in  studying  these  reports  to  keep 
the  mind  clear  for  the  principles  rather  than  the  details  involved,  and 
not  to  misunderstand  a  few  words  so  as  to  pervert  the  real  meaning. 
The  unequivocal  recommendation  of  the  Plaza  site  for  the  Union  Pas- 
senger Terminal,  coming,  as  it  does,  with  the  weight  of  Mr.  Arnold's 
experience  behind  it,  cannot  be  disregarded,  and  is  finally  summed  up 
in  the  following  paragraph: 

"It  does  not  take  a  lengthy  study  of  the  plan  of  the  city 
and  its  transportation  requirements-  to  discover  there  is  one 
site  which  is  adapted  to  fulfill  the  requirements  of  a  grand 
central  depot  and  transfer  station,  and  this  location  is  in  the 
immediate  vicinity  of  the  Plaza."  (Report  of  Bidn  J.  Ar- 
nold, October,  1911;  Sachse,  305  et  al.) 

The  material  difference  between  the  Arnold  Plan  and  the  Railroad 
Commission's  engineer's  plan  is  that  the  former  planned  a  station  on  the 
east  side  of  the  Plaza,  facing  west,  and  the  latter  on  the  north  side,  fac- 

43 


ing  south,  with,  of  course,  the  Arnold  Plan  on  the  existing  Plaza  and  the 
Sachse  Plan  on  the  proposed  New  Plaza. 

In  the  vicinity  of  the  Plaza  and  extending  thence  toward  the  retail 
districts  of  the  city  is  already  a  very  considerable  development  of  a 
site  and  beginning  of  a  splendid  Civic  and  Administration  Center — the 
Court  House,  the  Hall  of  Eecords,  Post  Office,  Custom  House,  the  site 
bought  for  the  new  City  Hall,  the  projects  of  J.  S.  Dodge  Civic  Center 
plan  presented  to  the  Mayor  and  Council,  December,  1919,  the  plans 
of  the  Temple  Block  by  the  Civic  Center  League,  the  plans  of  the  Fifth 
Street  Association  for  the  Art  and  Culture,  and  so  on;  which  will  develop 
in  this  location  a  monumental  group  of  buildings  clustered  about  the 
same  highways,  streets,  thoroughfares  and  transportation  facilities  that 
are  a  necessary  part  of  a  Union  Terminal  Station  and  that  will  operate 
conjointly  for  the  Civic  Center  and  the  Union  Terminal  without  inter- 
fering the  one  with  the  other,  but  each  taking  advantage  of  the  oppor- 
tunities presented  by  the  existence  of  others  in  the  same  vicinity. 


FBEIGHT  FACILITIES 

A  study  of  the  freight  facilities,  both  historically  as  to  how  the  pres- 
ent conditions  grew  into  existence,  and  as  to  the  continual  requests  of  the 
several  railroads  for  further  extensions  along  the  same  lines,  and  as  to 
the  experience  of  other  cities,  leads  us  to  believe  that  the  recommenda- 
tions condensed  into  the  statement  of  the  Sachse  Eeport  (page  13),  for 
freight  facilities,  are  the  correct  solution  of  the  difficulties,  excepting  that 
we  recommend  as  to  paragraph  4,  page  13,  that  there  should  not  be  estab- 
lished a  single  union  freight  station  for  less  than  carload  freight,  but  that 
the  City  should  encourage  the  building  of  several  L.  C.  L.  freight  stations 
throughout  its  present  and  future  area,  including  the  Harbor  District  and 
the  San  Fernando  District,  which  freight  facilities  should  be  for  joint 
operation  of  all  present  and  future  railroads,  but  that  no  new  freight 
station  or  yard  shall  be  fed  by  main  line  tracks  crossing  or  laid  on  impor- 
tant streets  at  grade.  (See  this  Report,  page  26.) 


45 


SUBWAY  SYSTEM  IN  LOS  ANGELES 

We  recommend  that  the  Council  associate  itself,  through  its  engineers 
associated  with  a  committee  of  engineers  appointed  by  the  Council,  with 
the  Railroad  Commission  and  the  engineers  of  the  Eailroad  Commission 
for  the  further  study  and  preparation  of  tentative  plans  for  a  subway 
adapted  to  interurban  and  suburban  traffic,  which  study  should  carry  with 
it  the  preparation  of  a  scheme  for  operation,  taking  conditions  as  they 
are  now  and  ending  with  the  completely  operated  subway,  if  such  is 
advisable,  showing,  step  by  step,  what  can  and  should  be  done,  with  an 
estimate  of  costs  thereon  and  suggestion  as  to  financial  schemes  for  con- 
struction. 

Until  surface  traffic  congestion  over  all  the  possible  north  and  south 
thoroughfares  makes  a  subway  a  necessity,  the  northern  and  southern 
divisions  of  the  Pacific  Electric  can  be  routed  over  Aliso  Street,  San 
Pedro  Street,  or  other  streets  or  private  rights  of  way,  and  since  the  re- 
routing of  the  Los  Angeles  Eailway  cars  can  be  even  further  improved,  it 
is  possible  to  dispense  with  the  immediate  construction  of  a  subway; 
although  it  would  seem  at  the  present  moment  that  a  subway  is  ultimately 
necessary  to  relieve  surface  traffic,  but  the  need  is  not  now  immediately  in 
sight,  and  when  the  necessity  does  arise  the  subways  will  be  developed  as 
a  system  and  not  as  an  isolated  line.  The  present  custom  is  for  a  subway 
to  relieve  the  streets  of  some  of  the  "heavy-car  traffic"  and  not  of  the 
light  traffic;  in  other  words,  to  develop  a  high-speed  through  service  and 
not  a  service  that  stops  at  every  corner;  it  should  be  adapted  to  the  con- 
venience of  suburban  and  interurban  passengers  who  desire  to  get  on  or 
off  the  trains  not  at  a  single  station  that  may  happen  to  be  convenient 
for  the  operation  of  the  cars,  but  at  several  stations  more  convenient  to 
the  passengers'  ultimate  destination. 

The  importance  of  the  subway,  as  seen  by  the  engineers  of  the  Eail- 
road Commission,  is  shown  by  their  having  incorporated  it  in  each  of  the 
plans  presented,  the  thought  being  that  this  subway  is  essential  to  Los 
Angeles,  the  time  of  construction  being  when  all  available  lines  of  surface 
traffic  become  overcrowded. 


46 


COSTS 

The  grand  totals  at  the  foot  of  the  cost  estimates  in  both  the  Sachse 
Report  and  the  Conference  Report  do  not  represent  the  costs  of  equal 
facilities  at  each  site  and  therefore  are  not  a  fair  comparison  between  the 
costs  of  different  sites.  The  Sachse  Plaza  Plan  is  designed  for  modern 
fireproof  buildings,  with  22  platform  tracks  and  with  full  and  complete 
systems  of  all  that  goes  with  such  a  station,  and  that  many  passenger 
platform  tracks;  while  the  Arcade  site  provides  only  12  platform  tracks 
(with  an  even  less  proportion  of  the  appurtenances),  fed  from  the  main 
line  by  an  inclined  throat  necessarily  slower  than  the  Plaza  throat;  so 
that  a  fair  comparison  of  the  facilities  offered  would  be  to  compare  the 
full  Arcade  site  of  12  tracks  with  the  building  of  a  10-track  station  at  the 
Plaza;  or,  in  the  reverse,  to  raise  the  Arcade  site  to  more  than  22  tracks, 
which  cannot  be  done,  even  if  such  a  station  could  be  fed  by  the  greatest 
possible  increase  of  the  inclined  throat.  There  is  also  at  the  Plaza  a  direct 
connection  with  the  subway,  which  cannot  be  obtained  at  the  Arcade  at 
any  cost,  and  there  is  at  the  Plaza  site  the  open  park  into  which  all  the 
main  diagonal  streets  and  suburban  roads  center.  The  Commission  engi- 
neers estimate  this  Arcade  Plaza  would  add  $1,982,251.00  to  be  added  to 
the  Arcade  total,  and  more  express  facilities  must  be  added  to  the  esti- 
mate of  the  Arcade,  which  the  engineers  estimate  at  $73,300.  There  should 
also  be  added  to  the  estimate  of  the  Arcade  the  additional  cost  of  fire- 
proof trestles  in  place  of  the  proposed  wooden  structures;  and  the  Arcade 
is  by  no  means  of  modern  design. 

These  corrections  being  made,  it  is  found  that  for  a  12-platform  track 
capacity  at  each  place,  the  Union  Passenger  Terminal  and  approaches  at 
the  Plaza  site  would  cost  $6,328,161  and  at  the  Arcade  site  $4,812,278, 
and  for  22  tracks  at  each  place: 

Plaza  Site $6,568,261 

Arcade  Site $6,052,378 

At  the  Plaza  there  would  be  added  only  the  cost  for  tracks  and  plat- 
forms, while  at  the  Arcade  there  would  also  be  land  to  buy  on  which  to 
lay  the  tracks. 

These  figures  apply  purely  to  the  passenger  facilities. 

In  the  grand  totals  of  the  report  there  is  included  for  each  site  the 
sum  of  $6,700,000.00  for  grade  crossing  elimination  between  Los  Angeles 
and  Pasadena.  It  is  quite  proper  that  this  sum  should  appear  in  the  broad 
study  of  the  subject  given  in  the  Report,  but  it  has  no  connection  what- 
ever with  the  problem  of  terminals  in  the  City  and  should  be  set  apart 
very  distinctly;  otherwise  the  impression  will  go  abroad  that  the  terminals 
would  cost  nearly  seven  million  dollars  more  than  is  really  the  case. 

To  further  clarify  the  matter,  the  cost  of  elevating  the  Pacific  Elec- 
tric Southern  Division  tracks  from  Wall  Street  to  Fourteenth  Street,  with 
addition  for  substituting  permanent  materials  for  wood,  should  be  placed 
under  the  head  of  Grade  Crossing  Elimination.  The  work  would  be  done 

47 ;' 


to  lift  the  tracks  off  the  streets,  which  can  be  done,  or  left  undone,  with- 
out any  effect  on  station  costs. 

With  these  and  cognate  matters  in  mind  the  following  tabulation  of 
equal  facility  costs  has  been  tabulated. 

The  unit  prices  are  those  of  the  Commission  engineers  as  of  1917. 
As  previously  noted,  it  would  be  irrational  to  use  the  peak  prices  of 
March,  1920. 


48 


UNION  PASSENGER  TERMINAL  COSTS  FOR  EQUAL  CAPACITY. 


Capacity:  12  Platform  Tracks 

PLAZA 

ARCADE 

Union  Passenger  Station  and  Approach 
Tracks     

$  6,328,161 

$  4,812,278 

Freight  Facilities     

6,040,150 

6,040,150 

Additional  Tracks  

401,144 

388,853 

TOTALS  

$12,769,455 

$11,241,281 

Capacity:  22  Platform  Tracks 

Items  as  above,  for  12  platform  tracks  

$12,769,455 

$11,241,281 

10  additional  platform  tracks  

240,100 

240,100 

Land  for  additional  platform  tracks  

nil 

1,000,000 

TOTALS  

$13,009,555 

$12,481,381 

Rapid  Transit  Associated  With  Above 
Elevated:  Alameda  Street  to  Brooklyn 
Avenue     

nil 

$  1,328,923 

Main  Street  Subway  and  Approach,  com- 
mon  to   all   sites;   to   be   built   when 
actual  need  demands  

$  5,552,406 

$  5,552,406 

Rapid  Transit,  Grade  Elimination  Pacific 
Electric,  Wall  to  14th  Street  

2,228,340 

2,228,340 

TOTALS  

$  7,780,746 

$  9,109,669 

GRAND  TOTALS  OF  TERMINALS.  .  .  . 
Ultimate 
Relative  Value  of  Terminals  

$20,890,301 
100% 

$21,591,050 
66% 

GRADE  CROSSING  ELIMINATION  AND  UNION  PASSENGER  TER- 
MINAL. 


TOTAL  FOR  TERMINALS  (above) 

Grade  Crossing  Elimination  in  City  Proper 
(N.  Main  and  Redondo  Street  Viaduct 
included  in  both  cases  for  reasons  given) 

GRAND  TOTAL  FOR  ALL  WORK 
SHOWN  ON  PLANS,  PERTAINING 
TO  TERMINALS.. 


PLAZA 

$20,890,301 

$  5,453,707 


$26,343,008 


ARCADE 
$21,591,050 


$  5,519,315 


$27,110,365 


Grade  Crossing  Elimination  between  Los  Angeles  and  Pasadena .  $6,700,000. 
(Note. — Of  this  the  Pacific  Electric  crossing  of  Mission  Road  at  Eose- 
hill  has  already  been  completed.) 


49 


NOTES  ON  COSTS 

T'nit  costs  of  material  and  labor  are  constantly  changing,  but  not  all 
at  the  same  rate,  and  no  matter  what  design  is  selected  and  built  the 
cost  will  be  spread  over  a  series  of  years;  and  in  work  of  this  kind  unex- 
pected opportunities  frequently  occur  to  make  desirable  changes  of  design 
or  to  take  advantage  of  special  opportunities.  At  the  present  time  the 
costs  of  material  seem  on  the  whole  to  be  distinctly  decreasing,  although 
deliveries  are  very  irregular.  The  cost  of  common  labor  is  showing  a 
decided  tendency  to  drop;  the  cost  of  skilled  labor  is  holding  about  the 
same,  although  the  efficiency  is  still  slightly  decreasing.  There  seems  to 
be  a  very  strong  feeling  that  the  average  cost  of  construction,  including 
all  kinds  of  material  and  labor,  will  distinctly  and  markedly  drop  in  the 
next  few  years,  but  may  never  get  down  again  to  as  low  as  before  the  war, 
although  it  is  probable  that  it  will  get  back  again  so  as  to  render  the 
total  cost  of  any  design  carried  out  to  be  substantially  the  same  as  esti- 
mates of  the  Sachse  Report. 

The  rate  of  expenditure  of  money  for  any  design  would  be  slow,  both 
for  the  land  required  and  for  tlie  structures,  and  a  number  of  structures 
could  be  omittted  until  the  needs  therefor  should  grow.  The  Engineering 
Conference  advised  the  total  elimination  of  the  Macy  Street  viaduct 
across  the  Plaza  yard  and  the  inclined  subway  under  the  Plaza  throat. 

Comparison  of  cost  of  grade  elimination  must  be  made  in  the  same 
way  as  the  comparisons  of  the  costs  of  stations,  by  seeing  that  similar 
conditions  are  complied  with  in  whatever  design  is  adopted,  but  inasmuch 
as  your  Advisory  Committee  are  so  unqualifiedly  in  favor  of  the  river 
bank  location  for  the  main  carriers,  and  of  the  ultimate  total  elimination 
of  traffic  from  Alameda  Street,  and  the  selection  of  a  location  near  the 
Pla^a  for  the  Union  Passenger  Station,  we  do  not  feel  that  a  discussion  of 
the  minor  rearrangement  of  the  cost  of  grade  crossing  elimination  is  called 
for  at  the  present  time  of  unsettled  prices. 


60 


JURISDICTION  OF  THE  RAILROAD  COMMISSION 

Reference  has  already  been  made  to  the  extremely  important  funda- 
mental position  of  the  present  time,  namely,  that  the  consideration  of  the 
whole  problem  can  now  be  undertaken  in  broader  and  more  effective  way 
than  ever  before,  and  certainly  in  much  broader  way  than  was  possible 
at  the  time  of  the  Robinson  Report  of  1909,  or  the  Arnold  Report  of  1911, 
or  even  than  the  Howell-Hamlin-Storrow  Report  of  1916,  because  the  juris- 
diction of  the  Railroad  Commission  over  the  matters  at  interest  was 
kindly  but  firmly  disputed  by  the  City  of  Los  Angeles,  and  this  denial 
received  the  support  of  the  attorneys  of  the  railroads  in  their  statements 
before  the  Railroad  Commission  at  the  earlier  hearings,  so  that  the  whole 
question  of  jurisdiction  was  taken  before  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  State 
of  California,  who,  on  June  11,  1917,  made  its  decision,  in  which  the 
following  words  are  used: 

"It  is  ordered  that  the  Railroad  Commission  proceed 
to  consider  and  determine,  upon  the  merits,  the  complaints 
made  to  it  by  the  plaintiffs  herein,  and  that  a  writ  of  man- 
date be  issued  to  it  in  accordance  herewith."  (L.  A.  No. 
5028;  also  L.  A.  5029.) 

The  City  of  Los  Angeles  continued  to  deny,  and  filed  a  petition  for 
rehearing,  which  was  dismissed  on  July  10,  1917;  and  thus  the  City  of  Los 
Angeles  has  really  by  this  technical  dispute  of  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Rail- 
road Commission  increased  the  power  of  the  City,  so  that  the  legal  posi- 
tion of  the  City  Attorney  at  that  time,  acting  as  a  defendant  to  the  com- 
plainants, was  really  to  substantiate  an  important  fundamental  condition 
for  going  ahead  with  the  work  which  the  City  Council  had  so  frequently 
and  so  strongly  advocated;  and  the  whole  matter  has  thus  been  placed  in 
the  hands  of  an  impartial  tribunal  of  ample  power,  fully  able  to  hear 
and  digest  at  its  true  value  all  evidence  of  schemes  or  suggestions  or 
recommendations  brought  before  it,  as  well  as  having  full  power,  and 
power  more  than  of  courts,  to  obtain  any  other  information  it  may  desire, 
and  to  take  action  on  its  own  initiative,  and  issue  enforceable  orders. 

Should  it  ever  be  shown  in  court  that  the  terminal  problem  in  Los 
Angeles  is  not  a  local  but  a  Federal  problem,  the  same  system  of  reasoning 
vests  the  above  plenary  power  in  the  Federal  tribunal  and  the  principle 
is  sustained,  that  the  City  and  the  Public  are  "parties  in  interest"  quite 
as  much  as  the  railroads,  and  that  the  going  ahead  with  the  project  of 
"Grade  Crossing  Elimination  and  Unified  Terminals  in  Los  Angeles"  is 
not  dependent  upon  the  initiative  and  voluntarily  associated  co-operation 
of  the  railroads  or  any  parties.  The  power  to  stagnate  the  development 
of  the  City  is  not  in  the  hands  of  any  corporation. 


001271231 


FINAL  RECOMMENDATION 
i 

We  desire  to  repeat  again  our  recommendation  given  on  Page  15, 
to  which  we  refer  for  the  details  of  these  several  recommendations. 
More  briefly  stated,  we  recommend: — 

1st.  The  immediate  abolition  of  grade  crossings  by  carrying  out  the 
design  of  depressed  tracks  along  the  river  banks,  and  the  build- 
ing of  a  Union  Passenger  Station  at  the  Plaza,  and  the  develop- 
ment of  a  multiple  system  of  L.  C.  L.  freight  terminals,  in  gen- 
eral accord  with  the  design  set  out  in  this  Report;  and, 

2nd.  That  the  City  join  with  and  continue  to  cooperate  with  the  State 
Railroad  Commission  in  canying  out  the  plans  for  the  above  men- 
tioned designs,  as  set  out  in  the  Report  of  the  Chief  Engineer  of 
the  Railroad  Commission,  accompanying  his  letter  of  transmittal 
of  July  31,  1919. 


Bespectfully  submitted, 


F.  W.  BLANCHAED 
MAECO  H.  HELLMAN 
H.  HAWGOOD 
P.  V.  BEVEEIDGE 
SAMUEL  STOEEOW 


52 


LU 
PUBLIC 


jt-ORNIA 

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